


The One With The End

by interabang



Category: Friends (TV)
Genre: F/M, Friendship, Humor, Romance, Zombie Apocalypse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-23
Updated: 2015-04-11
Packaged: 2018-03-17 08:40:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 58,201
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3522776
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/interabang/pseuds/interabang
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In 2006, a mysterious electronic pulse turns cell phone users into cannibalistic killers. Six friends struggle to survive and reunite in the ensuing chaos. Could there <i>be</i> more zombies?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Cold Open

**Author's Note:**

> 1\. This is a fusion with Stephen King's novel _Cell_ , and was written for the [apocabigbang](http://apocabigbang.livejournal.com) Round 2 challenge. It does not include characters in the _Joey_ spin-off.
> 
> 2\. Many thanks to SevlinRipley and HungryHufflepuff.
> 
> 3\. ishie's fanmix, _your words just echo_ , is [here](http://ishieland.livejournal.com/33631.html).

**May 2004**  
  
“Hey, you know what I just realized?” Phoebe said after she and the gang got their drinks and settled down in their usual seats at Central Perk. “This moment, right here… Kind of a huge deal! I mean, we’re probably not gonna be together like this in a while, right? This could very well be our last time here together, all six of us.”  
  
The others thought about that for a moment, then, almost as one, said, “Nah.”  
  
“Don’t worry about it, Pheebs,” Chandler said. “We’ll come back for all of you.”  
  
“So will we,” Ross said, leaning over to kiss Rachel.  
  
“That’s still a little weird to watch, by the way,” Monica pointed out.  
  
“Well, I’m not worried about you two,” Joey said, gesturing to Ross and Rachel, then to Monica and Chandler. “It’s them who’ll probably go away forever.”  
  
“What, so now that we have everything figured out and our futures are secure, that means we’re gonna forget where we came from?” Chandler asked. “We may be smug and self-assured, but we’ll still be your smug and self-assured friends.”  
  
“Y’know, Joey does have a point,” Rachel said. “I mean, we really are very happy for you two, but what with the twins and the new house and everything, who knows when we’ll ever see you again?”  
  
“Come on, have a little more faith in us,” Monica said. “I’ll tell you what: we will come back every other Saturday to spend some time with all of you. Promise.”  
  
Chandler nodded. “Yeah, I mean, it’s not like we’re moving to Yemen. And the kids have been great so far.” He reached over and put his hand on the stroller. “Okay? We’ll be here as much as we —”  
  
Just then, Jack and Erica both woke up and started crying.  
  
“See ya!” Chandler said as he and Monica jumped up and ushered the kids outside, leaving their coffee mugs still full to the brim.  
  
“And so it begins,” Rachel said as she leaned her head back onto Ross’s shoulder. “Looks like it’ll just be the four of us from now on, huh?”  
  
“Oh my God, Mike!” Phoebe said, getting up even before she’d gotten halfway through her own drink. “I told him I was coming home early tonight because, well…” She started staring off into space, clearly thinking dirty thoughts. “You know.”  
  
After she left, Joey shifted around a little in his seat, glancing over at the recently re-reunited couple. “Yeah,” he said awkwardly. “I should, uh, go check on the birds. Make sure they didn’t get stuck in the entertainment unit, or something. Later.” Soon enough, he was gone too.  
  
“Hm,” Rachel said, smiling as she intertwined her fingers with Ross’s. “That makes it just the two of us. But I’m not going anywhere. Are you?”  
  
“Nope,” Ross said, kissing the top of her head. A second later, his face fell. “Uh, actually...”  
  
“What? What is it?”  
  
“Oh, it’s nothing. I’ve just gotta go to the bathroom.” He wriggled out from under her and stood up with a rejuvenated, bouncing sort of energy. “I’ll be right back,” he promised. “Just stay right there, okay?”  
  
“Okay,” Rachel said, laughing out of sheer relief, and he beat a hasty retreat toward the back of the shop.  
  
Gunther came over and, to his credit, didn’t mention anything about having professed his love for Rachel earlier that day. Instead, he appraised all of the full coffee cups on the table and said, “Where’d everyone go?”  
  
“Oh, don’t worry,” Rachel told him. “They’ll be back. Don’t start handing out that ‘reserved’ sign yet.”  
  
He gave her a curious look. “Weren’t you supposed to go to Paris?”  
  
“Yeah, yeah I was,” Rachel said as he started picking up the drinks and putting them on his tray. “But I think, you know, it’s best if I stay here. I still get to see my family, my friends… And, most importantly, Ross and I are finally going to work things out.”  
  
“You chose _him_ over Paris?” Gunther muttered as he carried the cups away.  
  
Rachel heard him and thought, _Oh, what does he know. I did make the right choice. I did._  
  
_... Did I?_


	2. 1

**October 1, 2006**

“Hi,” Ross said sadly.

Phoebe was sitting on the long couch in Central Perk, about to take a bite of her muffin. She paused when she heard Ross, looked up at him, and winced.  
  
“Oh, no,” she said, putting her plate down. “It's about Rachel, isn't it?”

“What?”  
   
“Well, knowing you, it had to be about Rachel or something to do with dinosaurs, and I just don't think you'd be this upset over things that have been dead for millions of years.”

For a second, Ross looked like he was going to contradict her, but he sighed and nodded as he shrugged off his coat and signaled for Gunther to bring him his usual. “Yeah, it's Rachel. We kind of had an argument last night.”

“Oh, that’s not so bad,” Phoebe said. “I thought you two had worked out a system by now. Y’know, fight, have sex, make up, fight, have sex, the usual.”

“Well, things went a little differently this time around,” he said, sounding increasingly irritated. “We went straight from fighting to Rachel taking Emma to her mom’s. Do Not Pass Sex, or anything.”

Phoebe opened her mouth, closed it, then opened it again and said mildly, “Okay, that is _not_ how that was supposed to happen.”

The frustrated expression on Ross’s face softened. “No, it really wasn’t. Look, Pheebs, I’m sorry for being a little short with you. It’s just, you know, I’m still kind of out of it right now, what with Rachel leaving...” 

“Yeah,” Phoebe said, “I understand. And I hope she comes back before, you know, your wedding.”

“That would be nice, yes,” Ross said as he took his coffee from Gunther and ignored the glare that was being directed at him.

“So, okay,” Phoebe said after taking a bite of her muffin. “We'll figure out how to deal with Rachel Crisis #324 later —”

“— You've been keeping  _count_?” 

“But first, I have to ask: why didn’t you pick up your cell phone when I called you?”

“Oh.” Ross patted his pockets and felt the device's outline. Right before he left, he checked his landline twice to see if Rachel had called, but in the haze of getting ready and reeling from the previous night, Ross left his cell silenced and on his bedroom nightstand. He’d just grabbed it after his afternoon lecture before heading down to the coffee shop, cursing as he scrolled through the list of calls that were not from Rachel. “Yeah, sorry about that, Phoebe. What were you calling me about?” 

Phoebe pursed her lips and said, “Okay, I know this may come as a shock to you, so it's probably best that you're sitting down.” She patted Ross's arm comfortingly, drew in a deep breath, looked him in the eyes, and said very slowly and seriously, “The reason I kept calling you was because last night I had a dream that all the cell phones are going to kill us.”

For a long, long moment, Ross just stared at her.

“The cell phones are going to kill us,” he repeated.

“Yes!” Phoebe said. “And that’s not even the worst part. I went over my minutes because I used my cell to warn everyone I know! Or, well, knew.”

Ross shook his head. Even for Phoebe, this was completely out of left field. “And you think this is going to happen because…”

“Well, it was a very realistic dream,” she said as she leaned toward the table and broke off a piece of her muffin.

“Okay,” he said slowly, wondering if it would be wise to humor her. “How did… How did they kill us?”

She tilted her head to one side. “I don’t know. That part was very vague. But in my dream, a lot of people died, and it was really scary and, and gross, and unfortunately realistic. So I think it’s best if we don’t use our cell phones ever again. In fact, I threw mine away this morning. Wish I could do the same with the bill.”

Ross chuckled. “Look, Pheebs, I know you hate those things, but I kinda need mine. We all do.”

“That’s funny. Mike said the exact same thing.”

“Well, if you’re so worried about it, why aren’t you at home with Mike, you know, battening down the hatches?”

“Because he didn’t believe me either, so he went to his studio to work on some new songs. And I came here because I wanted a muffin." Phoebe picked it up and held it in the air, scrutinizing it for a moment. “This could be the last muffin I will ever eat. I have to make sure it counts.” She broke off a piece and slowly chewed it, then said, “Eh, I've had better.” 

Ross shook his head, then took his cell out of his jacket pocket.

“What are you doing?” Phoebe practically shrieked, causing Ross to fumble his phone.

“Checking my messages?”

She put down her muffin. “Really. Did you not hear anything I just said?”

“I think I'll take my chances.” He said dryly as he held up his cell to listen to it - then promptly cried out when Phoebe snatched it away from him.

“Give it back,” he said in a warning tone.

“Fine, get killed by your wireless network. See if I care,” she said, handing his phone back to him. He glared at her, then shifted in his seat and pressed the voicemail button again.

Sure enough, Phoebe had been the one to leave him several messages. In the first message, she sounded frantic and half-asleep. In the second, she was calmer, but repeated her warning about cell phones. The third one featured a song about Ross being a dingus – “Ooh, that reminds me, I'll have to expand on that later,” Phoebe remarked, leaning in and listening to her messages next to Ross’s ear – and in the fourth one, she’d yelled, “You’re such a pain in the ass, Geller!” before hanging up.

“If you were so worried, why didn’t you just come over and tell me?” he asked as he played her next rambling message.

“Please,” she said with a laugh, “I have a life, remember?”

Ross deleted the message and moved on to the last one.  _I knew I should've programmed Sandra’s number_ , he thought as he sat up, listening intently to Rachel's voice. The second he heard it, everything else faded into the background. As he scooted over on the couch, away from Phoebe, he listened to what Rachel had to say.  
  
_“Hi. Emma and I are still in Long Island. We're gonna stay here for a little longer, then you and I can... We'll talk when we get back.”_

Still in a daze, Ross saved the message and shut his phone, stared at it for a second, then blinked and slid it back in his pocket.

“What did she say?” Phoebe asked.

“I don't really know,” he said. “I think she's coming back soon, and she didn't sound mad anymore, so that's probably a good sign.”  _But she did sound tired_ , he added to himself.  
  
“Are you kidding? This is a great sign!” Phoebe said. “Like I said, you two will figure things out when she gets back. You always do.”

That cheered Ross up a little. “Yeah, you know what? You're right.” He sighed in relief. “I think everything's gonna be okay.”

“ _Ahhh_!”

Ross jumped in his seat a little, turning around to pinpoint the source of the noise. A man at the counter had yelled in obvious pain, holding his cell phone away from his face and jamming a finger in his ear. For a wild, crazy moment, Ross thought that what Phoebe had predicted was coming true, that it really was the end of the world.

Then the man shook his head, apologizing to Gunther as he put his phone back to his ear. “Don’t know what the hell that was,” the customer said. “Must've been the damn reception.” 

Ross turned back around in his seat, fixing a slightly smug look upon his friend.

“Well, Pheebs,” he said a little smugly, “if the cell phones really are trying to kill us all, they’re gonna have to do a lot better than that.”

Then the large front window of Central Perk shattered into pieces.

 

 

 

“So, apparently Erica's been a little terror at daycare for the past two weeks,” Monica explained as Chandler played with the twins on the living room couch. He was trying to get them to pull his finger, but they both ended up grabbing it and just holding on, laughing like that was the joke.

“Really,” he said, only half listening.  
  
“Yeah. I think we might have to take her somewhere else. And if we move her, we’re going to have to move Jack, too.”  
  
Chandler looked up at Monica. “This is the third center we’ve tried. Maybe the real reason nothing’s worked out for us is because Erica won’t listen to anyone except for you. No one else can get her in line like Mommy can, right?” He switched his attention back to his daughter, who grinned and clapped her hands in agreement.

Monica blew her hair back from her forehead in exasperation. “Well, as flattering as that is, we need a sitter to look after them, at the very least. Okay, what with your commute to work and my hours, we can’t just let them stay here by themselves.”  
  
“I think they’d be all right,” Chandler said. “I mean, it couldn’t be any worse than whenever we left Joey by himself.”

“Good point. But just for now, I’ll call that new place that opened up near Mom and Dad’s. It’ll be more expensive, but we can manage it.”  
  
“I could still quit my job and freelance from home,” Chandler suggested. “Or be a stay-at-home dad. I could do this  _all_  day.” He leaned over and blew a raspberry into the twins’ faces, sending them into fresh peals of laughter.  
  
When their giggles subsided, a scream suddenly rang out from somewhere outside. Not the usual scream of some kid who was having way too much fun, but a genuinely terrified one.

Chandler and Monica exchanged a look.  
  
“What was that?” Monica asked.  
  
Chandler shrugged. “Maybe someone at the new daycare center heard that you’re planning to call.”

Monica headed into the kitchen. “At least they knew ahead of time.”

“Hang on a second,” Chandler said as he noticed some movement through the living room window. He got up, putting Erica down on the couch before he moved toward the window, gazing at a teenage girl on the lawn of the house across the street.

“What’s up?” Monica asked as she came over from the kitchen, with her phone in one hand and a piece of paper in the other.  
  
“That girl across the street’s doing her funny dance again,” he remarked, glancing over his shoulder and then looking back out the window. She was, but this time she was waving something around in her right hand and, after a moment, she…  
  
…  _Bit_  into it.  
   
Chandler turned to face Monica and asked, “Since when did our neighbors start eating severed arms?”

 

 

 

Joey was on the highway when it happened. 

Hours ago, he had automatically accepted Phoebe’s warning about cell phones. Right after the call ended, he’d rolled his window down and chucked out his own phone, afraid it was going to ‘get’ him.  
   
Five minutes after doing that, he realized that wasn’t such a good idea, and five hours later, he was still berating himself for throwing the device away. He’d had dozens of numbers that belonged to hot women stored in the phone’s memory, and he’d never be able to get them back. Not that he was going to call any of his one-night stands, but still!

“Stupid technology,” he said, glaring at the sleek dashboard of his car. “Who needs you, anyway?”   
  
Almost as if in retaliation, the minivan in front of Joey’s car jerked wildly over to the left lane, barely avoiding crashing into the stone and metal guardrail. It slowed, and after Joey drove past it, he was just starting to wonder how much the minivan’s driver had been drinking, when said driver suddenly rammed the vehicle into the rear fender of Joey’s rental car.  
   
He lurched forward, almost losing control of the wheel, but grabbed onto it as he accelerated.  
   
“Okay, okay, I take it back: we  _all_ need you!” he cried.  
   
Joey’s backpedaling had apparently fallen on deaf metal; the minivan sped up right behind him, slamming into the back of his car with more force. Panicking, he swerved all the way to the right. Letting his instincts take over, he guided the rental over onto the side of the road. As he did so, he vaguely heard the sound of honking further along up the highway, but the sound faded beneath the rapid thudding of his heartbeat in his ears.  
   
For a moment, Joey just sat there, attempting to absorb what had just happened to him in the last twenty seconds.  
   
“ _Dude_ ,” he said.

 

 

 

Rachel was in a grocery store in Long Island, pushing a shopping cart and occasionally glancing down at her daughter, who was sitting in the child seat in the cart, swinging her legs back and forth.

As Emma shook the can of nuts that was clenched in her hands and listing all her favorite juice flavors, Rachel found herself drifting in and out of the present, reflecting on everything that had been going on with Ross.  
  
Not just the previous night, but the past two years, and how they got to this point.  
  


> **May 2004**

> “What did he say?” Ross asked quietly, closing the door to the room that had been Rachel’s when she lived there before, and that was going to be Emma’s nursery.

> Rachel sighed as she put the phone back down in its cradle. “Well, the people at Louis Vuitton weren’t happy to hear about me flaking out on the trip, that’s for sure.”

> “So…”
> 
> “So, they’re not interested in paying for another one. Actually, Mark said they found someone else who, ‘knows the proper way to get on a plane and, more importantly, how to _stay_ on it.’” When Rachel finished quoting him, she bit her lip and visibly tried to fight back oncoming tears.   

> A few seconds later, she lost that battle, bringing her hand up to her mouth, and Ross was at her side in an instant.

> “Hey, hey, it’s okay,” he said. “You can always go back to Ralph Lauren, or find a job somewhere else. I’m sure there are plenty of other stores with names I can’t even _try_ to pronounce that’ll be happy to have you.”

> Rachel let out a small laugh that sounded more like a sob, and leaned into Ross’s embrace. “Actually,” she mumbled, “I don’t think so, honey. Stuff like the stunt I pulled gets around fast, and I don’t even want to think about the kind of recommendation Mr. Zelner would give me.”

> “Well, Zelner’s an idiot,” Ross said before reaching out and tilting up her chin, getting her to meet his eyes. “Don’t worry about him. We’re gonna figure something out, all right? You’ll be back up to your neck in peasant blouses and skinny jeans in no time.”
> 
> Rachel laughed again, and this time, it wasn’t tinged with sadness. “Maybe we should find a job in fashion for you, too.”

> Ross smiled, and smoothed her hair down with his hands. “You’ll see,” he said after they kissed and parted. “You’ll get something soon. Everything’s going to be just fine.”
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> **January 2005**
> 
> “Well, it’s not,” Rachel said. “It’s not a big deal. Really, Ross, it’s just a couple of drinks. Y’know, I finally manage to make some headway with my co-workers, and you make it seem like it’s gonna turn into one one of those pornos Chandler tries to hide.”

> “That’s not true, and you know it.” 

> “Okay,” Rachel amended. “One of those pornos Chandler _and_ Monica leave in their DVD player. Sure, the kids weren't there, but c'mon now!”
> 
> “I’m being serious here,” Ross said with a huff. “Okay, maybe I’d be blowing things out of proportion if I didn't want you to have lunch with these guys —"
> 
> “— Which, if I may remind you, you haven't wanted me to do for months.”
> 
> “— But you’ve all been getting cozy with them ever since you started working at Marc Jacobs, and I’ve seen the way they look at you. Trust me, they’re just waiting for the right moment to make their moves.”

> Rachel went from frustrated to incredulous in two seconds. “ _Excuse_ me? First of all, I don’t know how anyone could miss _this_.” She paused to raise her left hand, displaying the shining engagement ring on it. “And second of all, I thought I already made it clear to you just how gay my co-workers are.”

> “You’re saying this to the guy who’s seen Holidays on Ice more times that your little group has, _combined_ ,” Ross said. “Men don’t need to be gay to appreciate fine art, or to work in fashion. And it’s not like that ring acts as some horny guy repellent, either.”

> “All I’m saying is, maybe it’s about time I started making some new friends. I don’t know if you’ve noticed this, Ross, but our social lives? Not what they used to be!”
> 
> He frowned. “Three of our friends move away, and it’s the end of the world?”
> 
> “Oh, you know what I mean,” Rachel snapped. “I don’t really have any other close friends in the city besides you and Phoebe, so I’d like to hang out with other people sometimes. Y’know, instead of sitting around here on Saturdays watching the Discovery Channel, or helping you work on your stupid puzzles!”

> “Hey,” Ross said, pointing at her accusingly, “you said you liked the last one I bought!”

> “Yeah, I liked it for the first two nights we worked on it, but looking at a giant chipmunk gets a little _old_ after a while!”

> “Again, Rach, not a chipmunk. It was a prairie dog,” Ross ground out. “Look, if you’re so sick of, of being stuck here with me all the time, why don’t you try getting to know the women in your office?” 

> “Please, you know I haven't been getting anywhere with them!" Rachel clenched her fists and lowered them, barely keeping herself from stomping one foot on the ground. “I just don’t get along with those women.”

> He glared at her. “Right. Why take the time to get to know them better when you’ve already got the guys wrapped around your finger? Wayne, Tony, and, and Phil, and Ted? I’m sure they’d love to have some really excellent adventures with you - in _bed_.” Still scowling, he turned his attention away from her as he shook his head.

> After taking a deep, calming breath, Rachel walked over to Ross and put her hands up on his shoulders, then his neck, searching his face until he finally met her gaze.

> “You don’t have to worry about anything happening between us,” she said. “I love _you_ , not them. Come on, Ross. Do you really want to go down this whole paranoid jealousy road again?”

> “No,” he said quietly.

> “Then forget about them, and kiss me.”

> He did the latter, at least.
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> **September 30, 2006  
>  **
> 
> “It’s not that difficult to understand!” Ross yelled, pressing his fingers to his eyelids. “What, what don’t you get?”

> “Oh, I get it, all right,” Rachel said. “I think I’m getting it loud and clear, now. You want me to quit my job so I can stay here all the time.”

> “No, I'm saying that if you took some time off, we’d actually get to have dinner together more than twice a week and finally get to start planning, oh, hmm, I don’t know, I was thinking maybe our _wedding_?”

> Rachel closed her eyes, running out of patience for what felt like the hundredth time. “Ross, I can’t – I can’t deal with this right now. You said you’d stop giving me a hard time about my hours and my co-workers.”
> 
> “And you said you were going to spend more time at home, but look at how that's been working out. You know, ‘fashionably late’ doesn't apply to spending time with your family!”

> “Are you kidding me?” she asked, her fists shaking with disbelief and barely controlled rage. “ _Please_ tell me you’re joking. I feel like all I’m doing when I’m not at work is hang out here these days!”

> “Rachel,” Ross said, starting over in a low, steady tone. “We have a child to raise. We are getting married. Obviously not tonight, but someday, we will. Please try to understand that you can’t just drop everything here to go do whatever you want elsewhere, anymore.”

> She froze, stunned. “So you’re telling me that I don’t care about my own daughter?” she asked, her voice trembling. “That I don’t care about you? I gave up Louis Vuitton for you, Ross. I gave up _Paris_.”

> Ross rolled his eyes. “Again with the ‘P’ word—” 
> 
> “— _No,”_ Rachel said, so sharply and loudly that she even startled herself. _Emma's in the next room_ , she thought, and took a deep breath. “You do not get to joke your way out of this one. That wasn't even funny the first twenty times you said it.” 
> 
> “Well, I wasn't laughing the last thirty times you used it to guilt trip me.” 
> 
> They stood there, glaring at each other for a long time.
> 
> “Okay,” Ross said finally, in a sigh as he rubbed at his eyelids. “You know what? Call Phoebe or Phil and have a night out on the town with them, if that’s what you really wanna do, Rach. Just, just go. I’ll stay here with Emma.”

> Rachel continued to stare at him as the seconds ticked by, tears welling up in her eyes.   

> “No,” she said, then heading for the phone.

> “What are you doing?” Ross called after her. She could swear she heard a twinge of panic in his voice. A small, petty part of her enjoyed hearing it.
> 
> “I’m gonna take Emma to my mom’s,” she said as she picked up the receiver. “We'll stay at her new place in Long Island for a while.” 

> “What?” 

> Rachel turned away from his incredulous, wounded expression as she began dialing the taxi cab service. “Look, I really, really don’t need this from you right now, Ross. When I come back, we’ll talk.”

> As she brought the phone up to her ear and gave the address to the apartment, then her mom's place, she turned back around to face him. He was still watching her, looking like he was about two seconds away from stopping her, from reaching out to take the phone away, begging her not to go - maybe even kissing her if that would get her to hang up on the taxi service.

> Instead, he pursed his lips and walked away, leaving her in the living room to finish the call.
> 
> “Fine,” Rachel heard him mutter.

 

She still remembered what Ross had said the night she’d gotten off the plane, that they were done being stupid, and she remembered being in complete agreement with him. 

She also remembered the past two years with Ross. They shared some really great moments after getting back together – most of them were in bed – but she couldn’t help wondering if, maybe...

_Are you really ready to go there, when you go back?_ she thought. _You're engaged, and you have a child with him. You should be thinking about Emma, more than anyone else._

_Right, and fighting outside her bedroom every two weeks is a_ spectacular _way to raise a child!_  she argued back.

_But you still love him, don't you?_

Rachel frowned.

_Oh, we're going around in circles, here._ _Stop thinking about this for two minutes. It's why you left in the first place, isn't it? And it's not all that bad, since Joey is —_

Suddenly, someone brushed past her in the store, shaking her out of her thoughts. Upon closer inspection, she saw that the rude person had – unsurprisingly, to her – been a teenager, his shoulders hunched and his gait even more slouchy than teenagers usually walked.

“Kids these days,” Rachel said, looking down at her daughter. “You’re not gonna turn out to be like that, are you, sweetie?”

“I want orange juice,” Emma said firmly.

Rachel laughed. “All right, Ems, let’s go get you some.”

When she got to the frozen section, one other person was already at the milk aisle: a woman bent over low, flailing around and knocking all the cartons and plastic jugs off the shelves.

“Hey,” Rachel called out to the angry person, jumping when another milk bomb exploded onto the floor from the top shelf. “If all the milk’s expired, you could just let the manager know.”

The woman turned around in a jerky, unnatural sort of way to face Rachel, and, still bent over, she started walking toward the cart, looking like one of those wind-up toys Monica and Chandler had bought for Emma.

“Rast,” the woman said in an odd, hollow tone.

Rachel frowned.

“Oh, yeah? Well… Well, rast _you_ ,” she said, more out of confusion than anything else, twisting her cart away from the oncoming crazy person and entering the next aisle. Living in the city had taught her to ignore people who were acting out in public, so she forced herself not to look back and see whether the milk destroyer was following her. She didn’t hear any sounds behind her by the time she got half-way down the aisle, so she figured she was in the clear.

“That’s weird,” she muttered, pushing the cart down the deserted linoleum path, feeling more and more like something was not quite right. “It’s not Halloween yet.”

When she made her way toward the front of the store – avoiding a lone cell phone lying on the floor, which creeped Rachel out even more than the flailing milk lady – she directed her cart to the left, toward the express lane.

“You think we're being Punk'd?” she muttered to Emma, who seemingly had forgotten about her need for juice and was back to examining her can of nuts.

Suddenly, Rachel heard the sound of what probably had been dozens of cereal boxes crashing to the floor, and a loud, keening groan elsewhere in the store made her skin break out into goosebumps, sending her adrenaline into overdrive. Things had definitely gone from ‘weird’ to ‘get the hell out of here,’ so she was going to do just that.

After she’d give one of the store’s employees a piece of her mind.

“Excuse me?” she called out, still rolling the cart up to the express lane and trying to ignore all the crashes, bangs, and screams that were gaining more volume in the aisles. “Look, I don’t know which one of you thought this would be even the least bit funny, but —”

She froze at the end of the lane, her eyes widening and her mouth falling open as she took in the sight before her.

Normally, she’d have taken more time to get a closer look at the stranger, picking up on details like fake jewelry and shirt colors that should be banned from the public eye, but all Rachel registered was a man in a suit. He was half-leaning, half-balancing himself over the small counter between him and the cubicle, seemingly unbothered by the credit card device digging into his stomach.

She wasn’t focused too much on his stomach, though, because he was biting the cashier's neck. That pretty much got her attention.

All the sound seemed to rush right out of the store and into Rachel’s head, which started pounding harder and faster as she took in the sight, not even really believing it was taking place.

“It’s a dream,” she said. “I’m dreaming. I’m gonna wake up now.”

The man in the suit tore out the cashier's throat and he crumpled backward, slipping out of sight. 

“Any minute now,” was all Rachel could say in a small voice as she clutched onto the metal bar of the cart.

He was coming straight at her cart, spitting as he tore open his blood-spattered shirt, as though his clothes were too confining.

“ _Flaughn_ ,” he said.

“No, I - I don't want any flan,”  she said randomly, but was so shocked she could not move.

Emma did, though.

“Go away!” she yelled, throwing her can of nuts straight at the man in the suit. The can bounced off of his forehead and flew several feet away, and, miraculously enough, he dove for it.

“Nice shot,” Rachel said, momentarily impressed, then snapped out of her trance and started pushing the cart toward the door.

She pushed it clear across the parking lot, ignoring the sounds of screaming sirens in the distance, and thanked her lucky stars that she’d decided to wear her sweats and tennis shoes, rather than putting on heels and her current favorite skirt. Emma bounced up and down in the cart, and Rachel distractedly apologized to her as she neared her mother’s navy blue BMW.

Praying that this wouldn’t be like the horror movies she watched through her hands, Rachel managed to pull out Sandra’s car keys and pressed the automatic unlock button without dropping them under the car. She wrenched open the back door, hastily dropping Emma in her car seat and buckling her belt.

When she got into the driver’s seat and locked all the doors, she thought she’d never heard a more beautiful sound.

“It’s okay, honey. It’s okay,” she said to Emma as she twisted around and stroked her daughter's tear-stained cheek reassuringly. “It’s just a prank, okay? You wanna go see your bubby? Huh? Let’s go back and see her. When we get home, everything’s going to be fine.”

She turned back around in the seat, trying to think past the gory last few minutes in the store. Distantly, she could hear more screaming, and she barely caught the lightning-quick image of someone running through the parking lot, dashing past her car in the rear view mirror’s reflection.

“Joey,” Rachel ordered herself, trying to will her body into motion with just her words. “Call him, then go to Mom’s. Call Joey. Do it. Now.”

Then she froze, realizing what she’d just said.

Call Joey?

No, call _Ross_.

While she was still puzzling her way through that train of thought, another one occurred to her: Phoebe’s message.

_“So after you listen to this, you should throw your cell phone away, because it_ will _kill you.”_

And then Phoebe had said something about dreaming a bunch of cell phones eating them all – but this was _reality_ , damn it. Rachel was just starting to realize how real this all was, and dream or no dream, she had to call someone.

“Okay,” she said out loud, “I can do that.” 

She brought her hand up in front of her, with the cell phone clenched tightly in her fist.

She slowly loosened her grip and flipped it open, then pressed the button to get to her history screen. After she looked at the last two numbers she’d dialed and debated which one to press, she —

_Thump._

“Oh my God!” Rachel cried as she jumped in her seat, hitting the top of her head on the ceiling.

A woman had slammed right onto the hood of the car, baring crimson and coffee-stained teeth as she grinned through the front windshield’s glass, her eyes wide and empty.

Rachel instantly pulled her hand back, launching the cell phone at the woman’s face, and it bounced off the glass barrier, cracking it as the device ricocheted onto the gigantic dashboard. Rachel ducked, putting her hands over her head, and a few seconds later, she lowered her arms. 

There was nothing in front of the car, except for the van that was still parked across from her, and a small red streak on the windshield just under the crack the phone had caused.

No more monster in sight. Just the van. Just a thin streak of blood.

The cell phone.

Turning her attention away from the window, Rachel leaned forward and grabbed the device off the dashboard. The battery was still in place, but when she opened the phone and turned it on, she saw a blank screen.

The cell phone was broken.

O _kay, so, calling anyone is out of the question now_ , Rachel thought. She would have to go to her mother's new house and try to reach someone from there.

Rachel found the key chain, and with a definitely unsteady hand, turned on her car as she hoped the others were doing a better job at handling the end of the world.

 

 

 

Phoebe and Ross sustained minor cuts from the breaking glass, but they weren’t mortally wounded. They’d both ducked down on the couch when it had happened. When they got back up, it was pandemonium. Ross was still gazing at the front window in shock when Phoebe pulled him up and dragged him out of the store, ignoring the sounds of the confused, screaming patrons all around them.

It wasn’t much better outside.

People were rushing around, some yelling, others calling out nonsense words as they ran in a sort of shambling, animalistic way. Another taxi further up the road had crashed right into a vendor and turned it over, and Ross could’ve sworn he saw two people with blood caked around their mouths as they rushed past him and Phoebe.

His first thoughts were of Rachel and Emma, but when he pulled out his cell phone again, Phoebe knocked it out of his hand and crushed it with the heel of her boot.

“What the hell are you doing?” Ross yelled over the din of the ensuing chaos. His question was forgotten when a wave of screams resounded several blocks over. He winced and let Phoebe pull him away, bumping into several others as they ran from Central Perk.

Out of the corner of his eyes, down the side street and up toward the main one, Ross saw a police car pulling up into their street, and, almost as if from far away, he watched Phoebe scream at them as she waved her arms around wildly, “Put down your phones! _PUT DOWN YOUR PHONES_!”

“I think it's a little late for that, Pheebs,” he said, but she ignored him.

 

 

 

Joey surveyed the scene before him from his seat in the car.

He was waiting. Waiting for something to start happening in his line of sight. Anything.

“What the hell’s going on?” he wondered aloud as he shifted his gaze back and forth across the highway, keeping a close watch on a few other vehicles. One of them – the minivan from before – had successfully crashed into the stone barrier further up the road, but no one was getting out of the vehicle, and Joey could see a trail of smoke billowing up to the sky a few miles ahead.

He debated turning on the radio, but hesitated when he put his hand out to the knob as he remembered Phoebe's warning. Maybe the same thing went for radios, too.  
  
Then, he paused when another, more terrifying thought occurred to him.

If things got so crazy on the highway where he was, the same might have happened in New York City.  
  
The same things might have happened to his family. 

To his friends.

To his favorite hot dog stand in Central Park.

And maybe even to Rachel. 

 

> **June 2004**

> After Ross and Rachel broke the news of their engagement and Chandler cracked a few jokes – one of them being, “And this time, make _sure_ you two won’t puke right after the ceremony,” – the group had a celebratory dinner for the happy couple. The group got babysitters for the kids and all went out to a fancy restaurant, toasting to Ross and Rachel for finally getting back together.

> Everyone was pleased as punch with how things had turned out for them, especially Joey. He felt a sweeping sense of relief along with the happiness he felt for his friends. Not only would Ross and Rachel finally settle down and be a family, it was also about time that Joey got that last kick in the pants to get over Rachel.

> Only, deep down, he didn’t think he ever could. 

> Still, Joey was pretty sure something great would happen to him, sooner or later. He’d finally get to know a woman better and grow to actually like her instead of indulging himself in meaningless one-nighters. He’d done it before. He’d developed feelings, real feelings, for Kate, Ursula and... What's her face.

> Ross turned to him, interrupting his well, thought, and said, “Joey, would you do us the honor and perform the ceremony for our wedding?”

> Joey gaped at him, genuinely shocked. “You sure?”

> “Yeah, Rachel and I talked about it, and we want you to do it,” Ross said. “It’s kind of turned into a tradition between all of us, right?”  
>    
>  Rachel caught the surprised look on Joey's face, put her hand over his and quickly said, “But if you don’t want to do it this time, we could always find someone else.”

> Joey was, as usual, dumbstruck for a moment. Though, really, he should’ve expected this to come up. It took him a moment to regain his bearings, and when he did, he said, “No, Rach. I’d... I'd love to do it.” 

> When he flashed her a grin, it felt forced.

> “Oh, good, so we won’t have any best man issues this time,” Chandler said with an audible sigh of relief. “I could _not_ go through all that drama again.”

> “Aw, thanks so much, sweetie.” Rachel leaned over to wrap her arms around Joey's neck. “That really means a lot to us.”

> “Hey, no problem,” he said, squeezing Rachel’s back as she kissed his cheek.   

> Two months later, Joey moved to L.A.

 

He knew he had to get back home. He’d already gotten a head start on that, and he decided that he wasn’t going to let a little road weirdness throw him off.

Although, because of Phoebe’s warning and what had just happened on the highway, he didn’t think it’d be wise to drive anymore, so he got out of the car, and did something he used to go out of his way to avoid:

Walking.

 

 

 

Rachel could barely get out onto the main road from the grocery store because there were so many crashed cars and bodies on the streets. When she managed to get several blocks away, she rolled to a stop in what looked to be a deserted part of the neighborhood.

She broke down sobbing, not knowing what else to do.

_This must be what being in shock feels like_ , she realized with a profound numbness. It was shock from all the things she'd just been through: seeing actual _people_  tearing others apart and leaving them to stagger around helplessly, and the random memory of milk cartons spilling their contents onto the polished floor. There was a joke in there somewhere about not crying over spilled milk, but Rachel couldn’t think of one.

Chandler would, though.

_Well, look on the bright side of all this_ , he said to her suddenly, appearing in her mind’s eye and wearing his trademark smirk. _At least you aren’t in New Jersey._

Rachel let out a burst of laughter at that, then bit down on her lip before she went right on like that, laughing until she died.

_Stop_ , she told herself. _That’s not really Chandler_. He did have – _please, let it be ‘have’ instead of ‘had’_ , she prayed – a weird sense of humor, but at least his jokes were funny, now and then. Nothing about that last joke of ‘his’ had been funny.

Nothing about any of this was funny.

Rachel shook her head. _You have got to focus_ , she told herself sternly. _Greens do not quit, and you're still a Green. You have a child to protect. You have friends to get back to, a... Ross to get back to. There’s no place like home, right? Get back to Mom’s, get back home, and maybe then you can start freaking out_.

She wondered, though, how she could do that when there were so many wild killers on the loose. How she could make her way across hundreds of miles of what seemed to be a minefield of…

Wait.

Could the not-people really be _zombies_?

 

> **September 2003**
> 
> After dropping Emma off at Sandra’s, Rachel let herself back into her apartment to find Joey reading a book at the counter.
> 
> “Hey, Joe!” she said brightly, slightly puzzled at the sight. “Whatcha reading there?”

> When he showed her the cover – the book was called _The Zombie Survival Guide_  – Rachel was genuinely confused. “What? That’s an actual book? _Without_ pictures of naked women in it?” 

> “Yeah, it is a real book!” he said with an excited grin. “Some guy at work let me borrow it. It’s really neat, and kinda scary. But hey, if we ever get attacked by a bunch of these guys, we’ll know what to do, thanks to this!” He nodded with renewed certainty as he flipped open the book again.

> “Well, I guess it can’t hurt to be prepared,” Rachel agreed lightly, humoring him. She sat on the E-Cliner and listened to him read a paragraph.

 

_I really should’ve paid more attention to what he was reading_ , Rachel thought, checking on Emma – who was thankfully sleeping – by adjusting the rearview mirror. The only thing Rachel could remember from the book was that zombies didn’t have to be technically dead; they could just be infected with a disease that would make them violent and crave human flesh. She gathered that must have been what happened in the grocery store. Somehow, a full-scale virus had broken out and would hopefully – _definitely_ , Rachel assured herself – die out soon.

She never thought she’d accept an explanation like that so readily, but after going through what she just went through, any sort of explanation, no matter how ridiculous, would’ve made sense to her.

Rachel turned the car key in the ignition, ready to redouble her efforts in getting back to her mother’s house.

 

 

 

Chandler and Monica were sitting on the couch in their living room, each of them holding a twin and trying to speak as casually as possible about the recent turn of events.

“So, zombies?” Chandler asked.

Monica nodded. Or that could’ve just been her head quivering out of sheer terror. “Uh huh.”

Chandler blinked, rubbed his eye, then said again, “Zombies?”

“Yes, Chandler: zombies. You’ve said it so many times, it doesn’t even sound like a _word_ anymore!”

“I... I just…”

“Don’t say it!” Monica tried to warn him, but she was too late.

“Why _zombies_?”  
 

 

 

 

When Joey made it about a mile down the long, nearly empty road, passing a few crashed and abandoned cars, he finally found someone. 

Relief swept through him as he approached the person who was hunched over the closed trunk of a car – he glanced at the cell phone lying on the ground next to a front tire, which was further proof that Phoebe’s prediction had come true – and something more than relief came over him when he drew closer and registered that the stranger was a young woman.

Joey grinned as he stopped several yards behind her, and, out of pure reflex, said, “Hey, how you d—”

The woman whirled around and spit out a finger.

“ _AHH_!” Joey yelled.

The woman reared back on her heels, and launched herself at him.

Normally, Joey wouldn’t have complained one bit about having a woman literally throw herself at him, but the way she had tackled him to the concrete and was lunging at him, he gathered that she probably wasn’t trying to hit on him.  After getting over his initial shock, he used his size and strength to his advantage and pushed her off before she could bite him.

_Why is she trying to bite me?_   he wondered. _I mean, I know I’m pretty bitable, but still!  
_

He got a better look at her as she lay on her side a few feet away from him, still snarling. She really would have been an attractive woman and a good candidate for a quickie, except for the neon green streaks in her hair.

And maybe the fact that she was trying to eat him. 

“Okay,” he said, standing up, “you’re not in the mood. I got it. How ’bout we go our separate ways and pretend this never happened?”

She growled and charged at him.

Joey did the second thing that day he’d always tried to avoid: running.

Luckily, he didn’t have to go very far, since he targeted the car that the woman had been bent over earlier. Temporarily forgetting his suspicion of vehicles, he scrambled into the unlocked back seat, slamming the door behind himself just before the green-haired monster could get to him.

He watched her through the window, cringing as she headbutted it.

“Nope, didn't think so,” he said, then slid down the back seat, yelping she shook the car in fury.

 

 

 

“It’s ironic, isn’t it?” Chandler said, wincing as the sound of hoarse yelling erupted from somewhere on the street. “Usually when something bad happens, all you want to do is call someone.”

He was in the kitchen with Monica and the twins, still trying to push past the initial shock of what was happening, only to arrive to the conclusion that there was nothing left to do but stare at his cell phone on the counter and wish that whatever was going one was actually the World's Shittiest Prank.

“So, let’s do it,” Monica said. “The water and lights are still working, so the lines probably aren’t down.” Her voice sounded strong and even, but she hadn’t budged an inch toward Chandler's cell phone.

“I don’t know,” he said. “Remember what Phoebe told us earlier? What if it’s true, that the phones really have something to do with this?”

“The world _must_ be ending,” Monica remarked as she shook her head. “I never thought you, of all people, would ever take Phoebe seriously.”

“I wouldn't be if we both didn't just see our neighbor across the street go all Hannibal Lecter on a severed limb,” Chandler pointed out.

“I still think we should go for it,” Monica said, shifting Jack further up on her hip and nodding at the phone. “I mean, when have Phoebe’s dreams ever come true before?”

“What about the one where we had sex on the balcony?” Chandler asked, still trying to stall the inevitable.

Monica raised her eyebrows. “That was _your_ dream, honey.”

“Oh, yeah,” he said, momentarily lost in the fantasy.

“Let’s try calling Ross first,” Monica said, snapping him out of his reverie. “Then we’ll call the police. I mean, if we aren’t supposed to use the phones, we’d have gotten another warning sign by now.”

“Fine,” he said. “I’ll do it. It’d be nice to prove Phoebe wrong, anyway.”

He reached out with his free hand, balancing Erica in his other arm. Before he could even flip open the cell phone, she lunged forward, knocking it out of Chandler’s hand.

He and Monica watched it crash to the floor between their feet, almost as if the whole thing happened in slow motion. The impact didn’t break the device, but he kept his eyes on it, almost as if he were waiting for it to start spinning around and laughing maniacally.

“Well,” Chandler said, looking back up the same time Monica did, “I'd say that's as good a sign as any.”

 

 

 

After getting to Mike's studio and finding it empty, Phoebe and Ross rushed to her apartment, pushing past other panicking, weeping New Yorkers.

When they got two blocks away from her place, Ross’s face fell as he caught the sight of smoke billowing out of several windows. Papers, torn up belongings, and ash littered the street he was standing on. He already knew that they were things that had fallen from Phoebe’s ruined building.

People were still running around and there were crashed cars everywhere, but to Ross, it was almost as if the screeches, snarls, and blaring alarms had been muted, somehow. The smells around them, on the other hand, were overpowering: burning flesh, gasoline, and caramelized rubber.

Ross glanced at Phoebe, who was craning her neck up toward her demolished apartment. He knew they shouldn’t be hanging around here, out in the open where it seemed anything could hurt them. Out of the corner of his eyes, he saw someone flailing around nearby, but he or she must have been distracted with something – or someone – else, because they vanished out of sight within seconds.

“Look, Pheebs,” he said after clearing his throat, remembering to breathe through his mouth, “I’m really sorry about your apartment, but we… We gotta get out of here."

Ignoring him, Phoebe lowered her gaze, then moved toward something amidst the debris on the street. Ross followed her as she bent down and picked up something small, round, and white.

“Oh, sure!” she said to her busted smoke detector. “ _Now_ you're not beeping! Well, take that!” She reached her arm back and, before Ross could stop her, flung the object down the street.

Ross didn't know whether to chastise her for drawing attention to them, or congratulate her on her throwing skills. He opted for looking down, at something that had been lying under the smoke detector.

He bent down to pick it up, and when he fully saw it, his entire body flooded with ice.

Phoebe looked over his shoulder as he held up a blood-stained picture of the gang at Central Perk, one that Gunther or someone else must have taken. Ross couldn’t place the date, but the photo had clearly been taken after the group came back from their beach trip, right before he and Rachel had broken up the second time.

He and his friends smiled up at him, frozen forever in that moment in time, from behind a scratched, crimson veil.

All Ross could do was turn his head and cough violently. He nearly fell to his knees, but Phoebe grabbed him and pulled him up and away, letting the ruined photograph slip out of her fingers and flutter back down to the street.


	3. Cold Open

Monica tucked Erica and Jack into her and Chandler’s bed, smoothing her daughter's hair back as she watched Jack shift in his sleep and move over onto his side. She stood up and turned to Chandler, who was looking paler than usual.

“We need to leave,” she said.

“No, no, and also,  _no._ Haven’t you noticed how safe we’ve been inside?”

“What if they decide it might be fun to crash in here for the night?” Monica asked, feeling like it had been days since things fell apart, when it had really been a couple hours. “We haven’t heard anything from outside in a while. Maybe whatever this was has already died down.”

Chandler grimaced. “Okay, your choice of words? Not exactly comforting.’”

Feeling exasperated and impatient beyond reason, Monica strode past Chandler and over to the window. She moved the curtains to the side, peering down at the street. Chandler joined her a moment later, and she leaned her head against his as they gazed at the empty road.

At the far end of it, an SUV was parked halfway on the sidewalk with its front door open, but other than that, nothing else looked out of the ordinary."

“See?” Monica said, welcoming the feeling of being right. “No one there. Whatever that was, it didn’t last long. Come on, let’s start getting our things ready.”

“Wait,” Chandler said when she began to move away from the window, and she leaned back on the sill.

One of their neighbors, a nice enough man in his forties, was running down the street toward the SUV, but he wasn’t doing his usual Sunday afternoon jog. When he came into view, Monica gasped as she saw him being chased by five zombies, and she watched, transfixed, as he tripped and fell.

They were on him like flies, crowding around him and hiding him from the window’s view. His screams were muffled, but still audible.

Chandler and Monica quickly shut the drapes, and looked at each other.

“Give it another day?” Monica asked.

“Yeah _huh!_ ” 

 

 

 

“My  _leg_ ,” someone screamed from a place Ross couldn’t see as he and Phoebe continued their trek back to Central Perk. “Oh, Jesus, she’s eating my _leg_.”  
  
“Wait,” Ross said, grabbing Phoebe’s arm and searching for the source of the anguished cries. “Don’t you hear that? We have to help them.”  
  
Another sob rent the otherwise still, thick air, and what scared Ross even more than the person's wails was when Phoebe shook her head.

“Phoebe,” he said. “Please.”

“Oh, great, now she’s gnawing on my shoulder,” the voice announced irritably. “Just… nobody help me out or anything. Save yourselves. Too late for – _AAAUUUUGH_!”

“Well you heard ’em,” Phoebe muttered, and Ross forced himself into step behind her.

 

 

 

Long after he locked himself in the car and the green-haired woman stalked out of sight, Joey thought the coast was sure to be clear. He didn’t want to stay in the car forever, but he was still afraid the woman would still be out there. And if there was one thing Joey was more frightened of than little girl ghosts, it was a grown-up, real life monster.

He just didn’t know that fact until today.

Joey rummaged around under the front seats for a weapon, and felt a swooping sense of relief when his fingers closed around the handle of a bat. When he pulled it up, he noticed it wasn't aluminum, but it was better than anything else he had.

Licking his lips, he slowly unlocked the door and let himself out.

The woman was nowhere to be seen.

As soon as he relaxed enough to sigh in relief, he heard a low, guttural sound behind him, and he panicked, swinging the bat wildly as he whirled around.

His bat missed the zombie, crashing into the left backseat window of the car.

She was still coming right at him, clawing at his face. Though the bat was almost half-way through the car, Joey jerked his arms back and managed to clip the side of her head with the butt of the bat.

He would’ve found the whole situation kind of amusing – well, just the ‘butt’ part, really – except there was no time for laughing.

She went for his shirt, getting a mouthful of it, and Joey tried to shake her off of him, long past caring about chivalry and the fact that he’d almost hit on her. She fell away from him, tearing his shirt almost completely in half – luckily he was in a Two Shirt Mood when he woke up – and growled.

“Hey,” he said angrily, starting to choke up on his bat. “That was a nice shirt!” 

She let loose a full throated, bone-chilling roar, and headed for him again.

“Okay, well, it wasn't _that_ nice,” Joey said as he lowered the bat.  
  
At a loss for what to do, he shrugged off the shredded remains of his outer layer, and threw it at her. “Here, if you want it so badly, take it!”  
  
To his surprise, the woman grabbed his shirt, sniffed it, and promptly sat right down, loudly chewing on one of the sleeves.

Joey rolled his eyes, then looked up at the nearest highway exit sign.

A little bit less than two miles away.

“This is the worst day ever,” he said grumpily as he walked right past the shirt-eating woman. 

 

 

 

When Phoebe made it back to Central Perk with Ross, she didn’t know whether to be relieved, or terrified at the fact that the entire street was devoid of living people. It seemed like all the neighborhood's residents had checked out of the area for good right after things had all gone to hell. 

She went inside the coffee shop, leaving Ross – who’d said, “I’ll just, uh, stand guard,” because she knew he was too squeamish to go in with her – at the door. As she made a quick pass around the shop, all she could see were spilled drinks and broken glass shards littering the floor. She even searched for Gunther, but couldn’t find him anywhere.

Or Mike.

 

> **January 2004**
> 
> He looked up at her, smiling that delicious Mike smile of his, and as Phoebe lowered herself down onto him, he moaned appreciatively, sitting up and wrapping his hand around the back of her head and drawing her in for a lengthy, rough kiss, rolling his tongue in circles around hers.  
>    
>  When they pulled apart, he groaned, “God, you’re amazing.”
> 
> “Thanks,” she said breathlessly, lifting up her hips and getting a good rhythm going again. “I know, though. But likewise!”
> 
> “No, I mean it,” he gasped, letting her take the lead as he tightened his grip on the slick skin of her lower back. “I love you – more and more – every… day.”

 

Shaking herself out of her memory, Phoebe wiped sweat and dust off her face as she met Ross back at the door, grateful that he was looking a little better than he had at her apartment.

“Anyone in there?” he asked, looking through Central Perk's open window.

She shook her head.

“Mike's gotta be around here somewhere,” Ross said, sounding more sure of the idea than Phoebe felt. “I was thinking we could head up to my place so I can grab a couple things before we leave the city… unless if you want to keep looking for him.”

She nodded.

His expression faltered, revealing that he was only trying to be a good friend with his suggestion and that he didn’t actually want to look for Mike, but he squared his shoulders, trying to look tougher than he clearly felt. Even while caught in the midst of chaos and cannibalistic New Yorkers, Phoebe found herself almost smiling at his bravado.

“All right,” he said, setting his face again into an expression of determination. “Okay. Luckily for us, I’ve still got my dance-karatay training at the ready.”

“You really think that’ll help us?” Phoebe asked as they started walking down the street. Phoebe didn't look up at Ross's place and Monica and Chandler's former apartment, because she was afraid of what she’d see, that she’d see the same thing she saw of her own wrecked home. She quickly pushed all that to the side, choosing instead to believe that other buildings were on fire, not the two behind them.

Those two were untouchable.

“Uh, yeah it will!” Ross said, bringing her back to their discussion. “I’ll have you know that without my Unagi, any chance of us surviving this would be gone.” He turned to look at Phoebe as they stopped in front of an abandoned store that was also missing its main window. “Just…  _gone_. But with my sixth sense at hand, we should be totally —”

Just then, a snarling middle-aged man with a shirt that said “Female Body Inspector” came barreling out of the place where the store's window used to be, hurling himself on Ross’s back and tackling him to the pavement.

Phoebe felt herself go on automatic as she picked up a broken tennis racket and smacked Ross's attacker on the back of the head. He ran off, growling.

“Wait a second,” Phoebe said as she stared at the man. “Wasn't that —”

“—  _Phoebe_!” Ross yelled from the ground.

Phoebe looked down at him. He was lying on the street, one hand at a bite mark in his neck and his other clutching at his ankle.

“Oh, right, this is more important,” Phoebe as she let her formerly stoned friend run away.

 

 

 

“You worried about the others?” Monica asked Chandler as they sat with their backs resting against the foot of their bed, with her finest steak knives laid out before them. She felt a bit calmer, holding onto Chandler's hand as he rubbed her shoulder, but she still wanted to get out, knowing that the longer they stayed inside, the better chance there was of zombies breaking down the front door, and beneath her fear of that, Monica wanted to see if the other people she loved were all right. She ached with the need to see them, especially her brother and Rachel.

Chandler shrugged. “Sort of. I mean, Rachel’s probably with Ross and Phoebe right now, so they should be fine. If anyone will live through this, it’s gotta be Phoebe.”

Monica raised her eyebrows.

“And you, of course,” he added quickly.

She frowned a little as something else occurred to her. “What about Joey?” she asked.

“Oh, he’s fine too,” Chandler said, though Monica knew a part of him had already begun to worry. “He’s probably in heaven right now, you know. Just think of all the free food he can eat.”

 

 

 

“So… _hungry_ ,” Joey moaned as he took another sluggish, trudging step forward, dragging his bat on the concrete.

It had been three hours since he’d last eaten. He was already succumbing to the horrible pangs in his empty stomach. He kept thinking about the woman eating his shirt instead of him and started to envy her.

Even so, as sweaty and hungry he felt, he kept his other shirt on. At least he was well off the highway, having walked down the first exit into town and finding even more bizarre sights than what he’d seen on the road. All around him were scattered dead bodies lying on the pavement, and there were even more crashed or haphazardly parked cars. He’d been too scared to get in another one, which turned out to be a good thing, because almost everywhere he looked, the main roads seemed to be blocked.

The worst parts were the sounds he heard, the flashes of movement here and there that told him there were more zombies - _Gotta be zombies_ , Joey thought because of that book he'd read with Rachel years ago - running around, and knowing that if he didn’t find a place to hide soon, he’d end up just like one of the bodies he’d seen.

And he  _so_  didn’t want that to happen.

The thought of pushing on, of making sure his friends and family were alive, was what kept Joey going. He was just starting to consider taking a chance and checking out the next fast food place he’d see, when a car slowly approached him in the distance.

When it slowed as it neared him, Joey could see a family of four inside: dad, mom, and kids. Joey hadn’t expected them to stop for him, so when the driver rolled down the window and looked up at him, he was at a loss for words, even more so than usual.

“ _Lydia_?” He didn’t know what was more surprising, running into her here, at this time, or the fact that he remembered her name.

“Joey!” she said, leaning out of the driver’s seat. “What are you doing way out here?”

“And alone?” her husband added. He might have been the father of the kid Joey helped – well, watched – deliver. Joey wasn’t sure, but then again, he wasn’t sure about a lot of things. “You should get someplace safe. They don’t like going inside places.”

“They don’t?” Joey asked, not needing to ask who ‘they’ were.

“No,” Lydia said. “At least, that’s what we’ve seen. Haven’t you noticed that?”

Joey shook his head. “I just got into town from the highway.” He didn’t explain that he’d been too hungry to pay attention, much less admit he’d spent a good ten minutes walking backwards to make sure he wasn’t being followed.

“Hey!” one of the kids from the backseat called out to him. “You were on that one show! Look, Clara, it’s that guy!”

Joey got a closer look at everyone inside. The adults looked like they’d seen a whole platoon of little girl ghosts, but oddly enough, the kids in the back had the same look of cautious excitement, like they were almost enjoying what was going on. As far as they knew, school was out forever, so that was probably cause enough for them to celebrate.

“Yeah,” he said, waving at the kids. “I’m that guy.”

It hit him, then, just how devastatingly  _real_  the situation was. He knew that it probably wouldn’t sink in for the kids until much later. To them, this probably felt like an action movie.

Joey wished he was just playing a part in a movie. He’d really be kicking some major zombie ass in it if it were, instead of feeling like he had no clue what he was doing.

“Did you get to use your bat on anyone yet?” Lydia’s son asked, his eyes wide and earnest. 

“Uh…” Joey lowered his weapon, covered in scratch marks rather than blood due to him dragging it. “It’s really for emergencies. You should just stay away from all those weird people, all right?” He brought his free hand up to his brow and tipped it at the kids, putting on a fake grin. At least he could pretend to play the part of the hero, even though he felt nothing like one.

“Can we have your autograph?” the kid asked, and his mother groaned, turning around sharply in her seat. “ _Nicholas_!” **  
**

“No, it’s okay,” Joey said, maintaining his fake smile. The kid handed him a notebook and a big black marker from the backseat, and Joey signed the whole page with a flourish, thinking that would probably be the last autograph he’d ever give.

“Do you know where I can find some new clothes? Or a restaurant?” he asked as he handed the notebook and marker back. His stomach growled again, and suddenly that was far scarier than the walking dead.

The man jerked his thumb behind him. “Just keep going down this road, turn right, then right again to get on the main one, and keep going down it until you see a Marshall’s on your right. I think it’s a Marshall’s. Anyway, it’s one of those stores, and it should have a couple of fast-food places around it.”

“Guess we don’t have to worry about which of our teams is better anymore, huh?” Lydia said sadly.

“Nah,” Joey said, “the Knicks still rule all.”

That made her smile a bit. “Yeah, they rule all at _sucking_. Could be the last team on Earth and they still couldn’t win a game to save their asses. Anyway, you be careful, okay?”

“Yeah,” Joey said, “you too. Watch out for the, you know...” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “Z-O-M-B-I-E-Z.”

Lydia and the guy gave Joey a puzzled look, then nodded before they drove off.

As Joey stood on the sidewalk, watching the car gain speed in the other direction, the kids in the backseat twisted around to look at him through the rear window. Joey felt his chest constrict as he thought about the kids back home: Emma, Erica, Jack and Ben. He hoped they were all right.

When Clara and Nicholas waved to Joey in farewell, he raised his free arm to wave back at them.

 

 

 

As Ross leaned back against the wall next to the storefront, Phoebe examined his ankle, which was already starting to swell.

“It’s sprained,” she said, lifting up his leg so she could slip a small cardboard box she’d found in the store under it. He winced at the movement and put his hand to the area where his shoulder met his neck.

“Kinda worried about my bite a little more now, Pheebs,” he said.

She looked up at him, then screamed, “ _Don’t touch it_!”

“ _I’m not touching it_!” he shrieked back, jerking his hand away from the wound as Phoebe stood up and moved closer to his head to look at his neck.

“Yeah, you really are lucky,” she said. “Any more pressure, and you’d be bleeding out by now for sure.”

“I’d hardly call what happened to me ‘luck,’” Ross grumbled.

“I thought you had a sixth sense,” Phoebe said with only a hint of sarcasm.

“I do, it just... slipped from me for a second. Look, that's not important. Is it gonna be okay, Pheebs? My ankle?”

“Not now, it’s not.” Phoebe pursed her lips together as she stood back up, crossing her arms over her chest.“You should keep your weight off that foot. Let's go back to your place so you can let it heal.”

Ross gazed at her in shock for a moment. “What? No, I – I've got to get outta here, remember? Rachel’s still in Long Island, and I… We have to get to her.”

“How?”

“What about your cab?”

“That would be a  _great_ idea, if the bridges aren’t crammed with stalled out cars right now, and I’m sure they are.”

“Still,” Ross protested. “We should check.”

“Look,” Phoebe said, “if I had a flying taxi, we’d be on our way to Sandra’s right now – and I would be queen of all the land – but I think our best bet is to head back to your place so you can rest.”

Deep down, Ross knew that she was using his injury as an excuse to stay in the area, in hopes that Mike would eventually find her.

“But…”

“Ross.”

He caught the sound of her voice – the ‘don’t mess with me or you’ll get a guitar handle shoved up your ass’ tone, if a little gentler – and, after a moment’s pause, he nodded.

“Okay, Pheebs, sure. But do you think you’ll be strong enough to support me?”

“I carried triplets to term. I  _think_  I can handle half the weight of a full-grown man,” she said, and bent down to help Ross get to his feet.

 

 

 

The doors were closed to the nearest restaurant Joey came across, and they wouldn’t break after several attempts he’d made to crack them down with his bat. He moved on to the strip of stores that were past the restaurant and bordering the parking lot, and jumped a little when he heard a car alarm go off in the distance. The only other food establishment he could see was a sushi store, but it looked closed, like several other businesses in the area. It was eerie, how  _empty_ the whole place felt, especially during this time of day.

He looked up at the store next to the sushi shop, the one that still had lights shining on the inside. 

It wasn’t a Marshall’s, but a Ross.

Joey readied his bat as he walked across the mat in front of the store.

The doors slid open right away. He took a couple steps inside, then, after listening for the sound of ravenous zombie cries and getting nothing, he started walking down the largest aisle. There was, oddly enough, quiet muzak still playing on the speakers, and Joey was just thinking how bizarre the whole situation kept getting when he heard a clicking sound from behind him.

He froze.

“Drop it,” a deep voice ordered him. Joey let the bat fall to the floor, making a dull sound against the shiny, hard surface, and he raised his arms.

The man with the gun circled around Joey until he stood right in front of him. He was pretty big, and could clearly do some damage if he wanted to. Of course, he didn’t quite have Joey’s stunning good looks – at least, according to Joey, he didn’t – but that was neither here nor there.

The guy with the gun wrinkled his nose.

“Wow, man,” he said. “You  _stink_.”

Joey could see that the weapon aimed at him was a double-barrel shotgun. One hit to the chest, and he’d be finished. He tried to put on a brave face as he forced himself to tear his gaze away from the gun’s two holes.

“I know,” he said. “I get that a lot.”

Another voice from behind Joey called out, “Hey, don’t I know you from somewhere?”

The man lowered his gun. “Damn it, Elizabeth. I said to wait at the register.”

Joey let out a long breath, wiping the sweat that had gathered on his forehead. He wished the lights weren’t so bright. He turned around and saw five other people standing up slowly from behind the cash registers that were at the front of the store. Three of them looked like they were about his age, one of them was another muscle-bound dude who was wearing a torn, white shirt, and the one who’d called out was a pretty young woman with long, curly hair. When she drew closer, Joey could see a tiny splotch of blood on her shirt.

“It  _is_  you,” she said, starting to walk over to Joey and the gunman. “Honey, it’s him! Ross’s friend!”

Joey could only stare in confusion as the young woman walked forward and hugged him. After a few moments, he said, “Oh, yeah, I remember you! Ross’s hot student!”

She laughed a little. It came out sounding dry and strained, but it was still a laugh. “More like Tag’s hot girlfriend,” she said as she released her embrace and stood back.

Joey looked at the tall dude who was standing a little behind her. “Oh,” he said, shaking Tag’s hand. “You…” He paused and looked at Elizabeth. “And you?”

“Yep,” Tag said. “Small world, huh? But it's nice to know some things haven’t changed.”

When Joey was about to ask when the hell ‘you and you’ happened, White T-Shirt Guy pointed to him and said in an equally gravelly voice as the first dude, “Hey, I know you. You were in that one TV show, right?”

“Oh, yeah,” one of the women from behind him called out. “It was the show with the… thing. And the people, and that one place.”

“That's the one,” Joey said, starting to feel faint with all the confusion coupled with his empty stomach. “Listen, uh... any of you got something to eat?”

“Eat?” White T-Shirt asked. “How can you be hungry in a time like this?”

“Oh, I’m not hungry,” Joey said, “I am  _starving_.”

Everyone in the store stared at him, until Elizabeth stepped forward. 

“Come on,” she said, taking him by the arm. “We’ve got some snacks over here.”

 

 

 

Phoebe and Ross were struggling for breath when they got into his apartment.

“That was way harder than I thought it would be,” Phoebe said as Ross pulled his arm back from around her neck, relieving her of the extra weight she’d been supporting.

He limped to the couch and collapsed on it. “Well, at least nothing seems to be burning in this building.”

Phoebe nodded, her attention drawn toward the window, which had the apartment across the street on full display. “Yeah. The others are gonna be crushed when they see all of this.”

“How...” Ross took a long, slow swallow, his throat so dry that it clicked. “How bad is it?”

“Well, at least the fire hasn’t spread to any of the other apartments.” She sounded like she wasn’t too sure it would remain the case for long.

He closed his eyes. “Phoebe, please shut the drapes. I can’t look out there right now. It’s too depressing.”

“I know. How’s Santa gonna be able to do his thing for Christmas this year?”

She closed the curtains, then turned to head to the bathroom. The lack of outside light made Ross's apartment look gloomy, and feel even gloomier without Rachel and Emma’s presence, but Ross reflected that his situation could’ve been worse.

At least Phoebe was there with him. At least he wasn’t alone.

He settled himself back down on his couch, propping his injured ankle up on the apothecary table – something he would have balked at doing in the past – and closed his eyes again as he continued pressing a wad of napkins against his neck.

When Phoebe reappeared with a first aid kit and opened it, she said, “Okay, do you want the good news or bad news?”

Ross took the rubbing alcohol and soaked a puff of cotton with it. “Either.”

“You were supposed to pick one! Fine, I'll flip a coin to decide.” Phoebe started rummaging around in her huge bag, which she'd managed to carry with her the whole time.

Ross replaced the napkins with the cotton, and the alcohol stung him so badly that he started kicking his table, which only ended up hurting his other foot.

“Good news, _good news_!” he said quickly.

“Oh, now you're cooperating! Okay, well, the good news is your water is still running, along with your electricity, as you can see.” Phoebe dramatically spun around and flipped on the light switch.

Ross tossed the napkins into the wastebin next to his couch. “Great, at least there's that. What's, uh, what's the bad news?” He braced himself for the worst, like hearing about Phoebe finding a human head in his bathtub, or that his foot would never heal.

“The lighting in your bathroom is _awful_! How did you ever get ready in the morning with all that self-esteem shot to hell?”

Ross blinked at her.

“But you've lived here before. You haven't noticed that?”

“Guess I forgot. Fortunately, I look good in any lighting,” Phoebe said as she smoothed down her hair. “But God, poor Rachel!”

“Hey, Pheebs?” Ross said quickly, “I'm feelin’ a little parched. Do you mind getting me a water bottle from the kitchen? It should be in the pantry.

When Phoebe came back and handed Ross a bottle, she looked impressed.

“Seems like you've got everything anyone could ever need back there,” she said.

“Yeah, for like a month,” he said, taking a long gulp of water. “But we won’t be staying for that long.” He put the bottle on his apothecary table and opened the first aid kit. 

“What else do you have?”

Ross fished out a bandage roll and winced as he removed the cotton from his neck, ticking off all the emergency essentials he'd stockpiled for years. “Batteries, candles, flashlights, helmets and loads of unperishable food.”

Nodding, Phoebe said as Ross threw away the cotton and bandaged up his bite, “Boy, now I’m _really_ glad that you’re either very careful, or very paranoid.”

“I told you,” Ross said as closed the kit with one hand and wearily made the Unagi sign with his other. “Total and complete awareness.”

“Wait, what are the helmets for?”

Ross shrugged. “Getting them just seemed like a good idea at the time. Plus, I thought they looked cool, so...”

Phoebe smiled a little at that.

Something suddenly occurred to Ross. It had been creeping around in the back of his mind since he saw the first few people on the streets with what he’d hoped hadn’t been blood caked around their mouths, but after being bitten by one of them, he couldn’t think of any other possibility.

“I think,” he said, “there are zombies outside.”

Phoebe looked utterly nonplussed. “Well, yeah, I could’ve told you that hours ago.”

“Then why didn’t you? Did you…” He furrowed his brow. “Did you _know_ this would happen? Did you dream that the cell phones wouldn't just kill us, but make us kill each other?”

“Not exactly,” she admitted. “I —”

She was cut off by the sound of a loud crash that had come from the apartment upstairs. Both of them froze as they looked up at the ceiling, listening to the noises. A couple more loud thumps resounded down from above, and then there was silence.

“Looks like we're not completely alone,” Phoebe said, making Ross cringe at the thought. Having obtained confirmation on just what they were dealing with, a new, horrific thought struck him, shaking him to his core, and he willed himself not to touch the bite mark on his neck.

“Phoebe,” he said, trying to keep his voice calm and steady, but finding it increasingly hard. “You know what all the zombie movies are like.”

“Actually, I've never watched any, and never wanted to. Growing up in my neighborhood was enough nightmare fodder for me,” she said, though in typical Phoebe fashion, it came out sounding matter-of-fact rather than bitter.

“Well, in those kind of movies, when people get infected, they tend to...” Ross paused to draw in a deep breath. “Turn into one of them. You might have to... you know.” He swallowed, blinking back tears that had sprung up in his eyes. “Kill me.”

Phoebe looked down at the ground for a second.

Then she met his eyes and said, “Okay.”

“All right,” Ross said, his voice tight and grim. “So you’ll probably have to… wait.” His mouth twisted a little. “‘Okay?’   _Okay_? You didn’t even stop to think about it for more than a second. Do I… Do I mean _nothing_ to you?”

“Hey,” she said with a shrug, “you just turned into a ruthless killing machine. I can’t be swayed by my attachment to not-zombie you.”

He couldn’t help but feel stung by her flippancy. “Well, zombies could have feelings too, you know!”

“They probably do,” she said. “Feelings of intense, ravenous, all-consuming hunger.”

“Fine, you know what?” Ross muttered, turning away from her. “If I become one of them, I am _so_ gonna bite you.”

Instead of making one of her usual retorts, Phoebe settled down on the far side of the couch, looking at his ankle stretched out on the table. “How is it?”

“Better,” he said. "But not much.”

“We’ll get through this, right?” Phoebe asked him. “We’ll get through this, and so will the others.”

“Yeah,” he said. He was so damn tired. He was _beyond_ tired. The past few hours felt like days to him. “We’ll all get through this.” Just then, he heard another dull thump from upstairs, signalling that his neighbor – Pamela, the woman who had cooed over first Ben, then Emma, whenever she saw them with Ross in the foyer downstairs as she got her mail – was still thrashing around, and he pushed the thought of her aside, focusing instead on Rachel.

Rachel. Ross needed to call her and make sure she and Emma were all right. He didn’t have his cell phone anymore, but he still had his home phone. Since the electricity was still working, he assumed the phone lines probably were probably open as well.

He slid himself closer to the small table beside the sofa’s arm, and lifted his hand to pick up the phone.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Phoebe snap her head toward him. “What are you doing?”

“Seeing if I can finally get a hold of Rachel, now that things have calmed down a little.” When he heard a loud roar outside followed by screaming, he realized that no, this whole thing wasn’t really over, not by a long shot.

“No!” Phoebe said, shaking him out of his thoughts. “Don’t you get it? That’s why we weren’t supposed to use the phones!”

“What if that doesn’t apply to regular ones?”

“Oh, so you’re saying there are _rules_ to this, this freak show? Because the last time I checked, Monica’s not in charge here!”

It was a good point, but it wasn’t enough to convince Ross. He was tired of being left in the dark. He leaned over to pick up the receiver, and as he did so, Phoebe lunged across the couch to grab it from him, but he twisted away from her – crying out as the pain in his swollen ankle flared up again, throbbing in time to his heartbeat – and pressed the phone to his ear.

He held his breath as Phoebe draped herself over him, yelling at him to stop. The sounds of her desperate pleading were drowned out by the complete and utter…

 _Absence_ of sound.

Ross exhaled.

“There’s nothing there,” he said, not knowing whether he was relieved or disappointed, and Phoebe pulled away from him as he looked down at the piece of technology that had failed him and the rest of humanity. “Not even a dial tone. But I’m still alive.”

“Yeah,” Phoebe said. He knew she was glaring at him, angry that he hadn’t listened to her and further risked his life, yet he also knew she was just as relieved as he was. “I guess that’s one thing we can be thankful for. Although, I was kinda hoping you’d turn into one of them so I could kill you.”

“What?” he asked as he put the phone back in its cradle.

“Well, _one_ of my predictions has got to come true! I thought it would be that one.”

“What are you even talking…” Ross shook his head dismissively. “Never mind.”

“I must be losing my touch,” Phoebe said as she got up from the couch. “This kind of thing wasn’t supposed to happen until January, 2041!”

 

 

 

Rachel was on cloud nine – or, as much on cloud nine as she could be, in this situation. It had taken her much longer than she’d thought, what with using twenty side streets and avoiding a handful of zombies to get to her mother’s house. She held onto Emma’s hand as they approached the door together, and Rachel let herself in with the key. 

Inside, she called out to Sandra, hoping that she was loud enough for her mother to hear her, but not loud enough to attract anyone to the house. After she made a cursory sweep through the house and tried using the phone – which was dead – she realized, with fear crawling up her spine, that Sandra wasn’t there.

Regret flushed through Rachel as she remembered the last time she'd seen her mother. The night before, she arrived at the house, barely able to hold back her tears, and Sandra had accepted her with open arms. It wasn’t until after Emma was settled in upstairs and Rachel sat down with her mother that she found herself unable to talk about her situation with Ross, that all she really needed was a place to get away and collect her thoughts.

Rachel winced when it dawned on her, not for the first time, how selfish she'd been, and not just with running away to her mother's the previous night. She realized, again, that she almost always treated other people as a fallback for her, as a source of comfort for her problems, then barely ever reciprocated. Just the previous night, she ignored Sandra's advice and didn't even thank her for her hospitality. Up until a few hours ago, Rachel had been so used to expecting care and support from others, that when it came to a point of her losing it all, having to be the caretaker instead of the... takee, she did not know what to do.

She wished she knew what to do.

“Mommy,” Emma said, sounding just as tired and helpless as Rachel felt. “What’s happening?”

She sighed, rubbing her eyes with her fingers, and tightened her grip on Emma’s hand. She willed herself to be the strong one, to live up to her own title as the mother now, rather than the daughter.

“Nothing, honey,” she said. “Let’s get cleaned up and go to bed a little early, huh? Maybe Grandma Green will come back soon, and then we can go home.”

Rachel started up the stairs with Emma, hoping against hope that they'd manage to get some sleep.

 

 

 

After Joey filled his stomach again – a feat which everyone in the store watched with curious, almost awed expressions – washed up, and put on some new clothes, he joined the small group that was sitting in the men’s section, talking about the event. The wrestler-looking dude with the shotgun, Derek, was telling everyone his story of what occurred a few hours ago.

Derek was working at the sushi shop nearby, and he’d seen a teenage girl with a pixie haircut talking on a cell phone as he prepared her order.  Suddenly, she jammed her finger in her ear as she held the phone away from her face, then did the usual obnoxious, “Hello? Hello? Can you hear me?” bit until, out of nowhere, she dropped the phone and, within seconds, grabbed the businesswoman standing next to her, and sank her teeth into the woman's throat. Derek had only stood there and watched as the woman spewed blood everywhere from her throat until she collapsed to the floor.

“I pulled myself together and threw one of my knives at the girl,” Derek said, looking down at the floor, away from the others. “But I’m just a chef, not some kinda professional knife-thrower. I got her here,” he put his hand over the right side of his lower abdomen, “but it was like I'd thrown a toothpick at her. She just looked at her stomach, looked up at me, and then ran out of the store... _growling_. Like some kind of wild animal.

“The woman died before I got to her, but Shane and I managed to get out,” Derek reached out and grasped onto the hand of the slightly shorter, but just as muscular bald guy who wore a white T-shirt. It took Joey about ten seconds to get that they were holding hands.

 _Maybe they met at a bowling ball crushing contest_ , he thought.

“Yeah, we met up with everyone else you see here. We've all just kind of been laying low and hanging out since then,” Shane added. “So, Joey, what's your story? Where you from?”

“New York City,” he said, still wondering if there was a show on how to break bowling balls. He decided there should've been one. He, Rachel and Chandler would've watched that show in a heartbeat.

“You’re not planning on going back there, are you?” Tag asked, bringing Joey back to the present. “It must be sheer pandemonium in the city.” 

“I've gotta go back. My family's there, and so are my friends.” Joey's voice cracked a little on the last word.

“It’s gonna take you a hell of a miracle to get back home,” Derek said. “Why don’t you stay here and wait until all this blows over?”

“Sorry,” Joey said, “but I can’t.” For the first time, he was starting to feel a little less scared and a little more… something. What it was, he wasn’t sure. It wasn’t courage, exactly, but it was indeed something – and feeling something other than pure, gut-wrenching terror was a welcome break from wanting to go crawl into a corner and just let everything continue to happen around him, until he’d most likely get eaten by a teenager.

Chandler would never let him live that down.

“Look, I'm not sure if you've noticed, but it’s dangerous to go out there,” Shane said. “Maybe... Maybe those things out there will all just drop down dead by sunrise.”

“They won’t,” Elizabeth said. “I mean, in all the zombie movies I’ve seen, they stick around until their leader is killed, or until the military comes to wipe them all out.”

“Wait,” Derek cut in, his eyes darting back and forth between Elizabeth and Joey. “Zombies? As in…”

“Yeah,” Elizabeth said, lifting up her arms and letting her face go slack as she groaned, “ _Braaaaaaains_.”

“But that’s impossible,” Tag said. “How could cell phones turn people into zombies?”

 

 

 

Ross blinked. “What?”

“You heard me,” Phoebe said as she pressed the plastic baggie she'd filled with ice on his ankle. “You must have some idea. Aren’t you curious about how all of this started?”

He shrugged. “No, I couldn’t care less.”

“Liar.”

“Look, I’m not thinking about how this all started,” Ross snapped. “I’m thinking about Rachel and my baby girl, okay?”

“Yes, I get that. I really do,” Phoebe said, “but maybe thinking about something else will be more helpful then us sitting here worrying about them.”

“Fine,” he said, trying to keep himself from touching the bandage on his neck. “What… what do you think happened?”

“Remember that guy in the coffee shop? The one yelling because of his cell phone?”

Ross scowled. “That again? Look, it's highly improbable that cell phone signals could have turned people into vicious killers.”

“But not impossible. Isn’t there something like... I dunno, some kind of sound wave that could trigger the brain to go on a killing spree? Like those sleeper agents in spy movies. Ooh, or _Zoolander!_ ”

Ross opened his mouth to respond, then fixed Phoebe with a curious look. “You haven’t seen any zombie movies, but you’ve seen _Zoolander_.”

“Excuse me for having good taste.”

Rolling his eyes, Ross said, “So, you're saying that someone could have programmed a subliminal message that would be transmitted through the cell phone signals around the country.”

“Maybe not just the country. Who knows? Even if your cable wasn’t down, I don’t think we’d be getting any news coverage of what’s going on.”

“Yeah,” he said, even though he wished he'd gotten it working again so they could at least try and see if that were true. “Okay, so let’s say, _hypothetically_ , that someone or some group could even pull off something like this. It’d be like...” Ross recalled the laptop on which Chandler had downloaded some virus in Barbados, when all of his hard drive's memory had disappeared. “Downloading a virus into people's brains.”

“Exactly. We’ve always just been as easily breakable as technology.”

“But we’re still biological creatures, not machinery. I should know about this; I wrote a paper on it a few years ago. If only my colleagues could go back and look at it now, they’d think _twice_ about discrediting it.” That was, Ross realized, if they weren’t too busy running for their lives.

Phoebe shook her head. “Anyway, I think the... things we’re dealing with now is what happens when you take away everything else we’ve built up as a society. Deep down, we’re all just hungry killers.”

The corner of Ross’s mouth twitched. “Does that mean you finally agree with me about evolution?”

She turned over the baggie of ice on Ross's ankle. “I guess.”

Glad for the distraction of feeling victorious for a second instead of raw anxiety, Ross felt his mouth turn up more into an actual smile.

“Although I still haven’t ruled out the possibility that aliens did this to us. Or maybe gremlins,” Phoebe said, sending Ross’s brief bout of triumph flying right out the window.

“Getting back to things that actually make sense,” he said as Phoebe leaned back on the couch, “I think you do have a point about the cell phone signals.”

“Oh, I really shouldn’t have gotten you started on this, huh?”

“I’m serious,” he said, and then the lightbulb went off in his head. He grasped onto the earlier stray thought that had occurred to him about his laptop. “System shutdown. That’s what this whole thing's purpose probably was: getting rid of human emotion and everything that’s been ingrained to us through society and culture. All those people who were using their cells…” The eager, scientific part of his brain faltered at the lump in his throat, at the sorrow he felt for the fall of the human race. “I don’t think they’ve just been slipped a trigger, like with sleeper agents. I think they’ve been wiped clean.”

“Wow,” Phoebe said, “so this _is_  like the article I read in one of your magazines.”

“ _That’s_ where you got this idea from?" Ross asked. "And what have I told you about going through my stuff?”

“I was in your bathroom when I read it, okay? It was either _National Geographic_ or _Cosmo_ , and I don’t need any tips on how to achieve a better orgasm.”

“Good to know,” Ross said dryly. “Actually, now that I think about it, this did help a little.” It was true. As worried as he still was about Rachel and Emma, at least he had calmed down somewhat since this whole thing started. “Thanks.”

“And thank you,” Phoebe said, “for boring me so much that I kinda wanna fall asleep right now.”

 

 

 

As much as the others pleaded with him to stay, even for just the night, Joey knew he was wasting time, and he had to keep moving. After watching the streets outside through the windows and double doors until dusk fell, Joey saw less and less zombies running around. It was almost as if they were heading in the same direction, like they had a curfew. Even he was aware of the strangeness of that idea, but it provided him with more reason to leave. 

“Please don’t go,” Elizabeth said, her eyes sad and worried. “Ross and the others would want you to put your safety first, right?”

“’Course they would,” Joey said. But his mind was made up, so he filled a backpack with batteries for the flashlight that had been found in the janitor’s closet, snacks, and a spare set of clothes.

Derek said he would walk outside with Joey a little, and when they reached the front of the store, then turned and faced the others, he knew the rest of the group felt just as awkward as he did.

“Thanks,” he said to them. “Take care, okay?”

Elizabeth stepped forward and put her arms around Joey. He was surprised at the gesture at first, but relaxed, and patted her on the back. 

“I liked that show you were in,” she said. “Not that TV even matters anymore, but I wish it wasn't canceled.”

“Seriously? It was the biggest pile of —” Tag started to say, until Elizabeth elbowed him lightly in the chest.

After she drew away from Joey, drying her eyes, Derek told everyone that if he didn’t come back in ten minutes - “Not even you, Shane,” he murmured before they kissed - they were not to go outside looking for him. As Joey picked up his bat, the others called out soft goodbyes to him, and he waved at them before heading out the doors.

When he and Derek made it halfway down the sidewalk toward the main road, Joey looked down at the flashlight he'd been holding in his left hand, then put it in the side pocket of his backpack, figuring he didn't need the extra light. The lamps on the sidewalks still shone brightly, and as he looked in the distance toward the housing areas, he could see the faint glow of more street lamps.

Derek, meanwhile, was scouting the parking lot and the side-road leading up to the main intersection. When the men reached the end of the sidewalk, they stopped, and he turned to Joey.

“Looks like this is where we go our separate ways,” he said, shouldering his shotgun to shake Joey’s hand, then reached out and gripped onto his shoulder before he could start walking away.

“You need something better than a bat to get you through your trip,” Derek told him. “Shane and I have a place on Milton Avenue. It’s a twenty minute walk from here, but you should be able to make it in fifteen without any traffic.” He lowered his hand from Joey's shoulder and reached into his pocket, then pulled out a piece of paper; when Joey peered at it, he could see it was a makeshift map. “I whipped this up after you told us about New York. And...” He dug into pocket again to bring up a set of keys, and, after a moment’s hesitation, handed them to Joey, who was still staring at him, not quite believing what he was doing. “These are just copies, but don’t lose them. Big one’s for the front door, and the small one’s for the shotgun case. Bethany’s not as good as the one I've got now, but she’ll do.”

Furrowing his brow a little, Joey said, “Look, not that I don’t appreciate all of this, but —”

“— I’m doing this because you’ve got people back at home that you love, Joe, more than anything else in the world. I could see that, too, right when you said you were going to New York. Nothing’s gonna stop you from going back to them, and me…” Derek looked back at the storefront, then turned back to Joey. “Well, I know that if I were in your shoes, it'd take a lot more than zombies to keep me from my loved ones.”

“Thanks, man,” Joey said, clapping him on the arm. “You, uh, take care of everyone, okay? Tag and Elizabeth, they're good people. They deserve to make it through this... Whatever _this_ is.”

“Yeah, I know,” Derek said, then added, “And you take care of Bethany, all right?”

“I will,” After contemplating something, which was a rare occurrence for Joey, he said, “Hey, if you ever change your mind, come to New York, okay? I know you all don't want to leave your homes here, but if you decide to leave, come find me. I’ll...” He surprised himself even further with another idea. “I’ll leave marks on the signs so you’ll know where to go, starting with I-40.” 

“Okay,” Derek said, though without the stunned expression Joey would’ve seen on his friends’ faces if they'd heard what he said. “You know how to use a shotgun, right?”

“Sure do,” Joey said. “I had to learn how to shoot one for a movie.” The truth was, he had to learn _after_ being cast because he lied about knowing how to use one, but it hadn’t been that hard: just point, shoot, and try not to stumble back too much because of the recoil. Or at least try to look cool while stumbling.

“Really?” Derek asked. “What was it called?”

“You don't want to know.”

“Ouch,” Derek said with a wince. “That bad, huh?”

“No, that was the title: _You Don't Want to Know_.”

“So, how did it do?”

“This time, you _really_ don't want to know,” Joey said as he began to walk away from Derek. “Anyway, I’ll take care of your shotgun. You, uh... named it Bethany?”

“Don’t you name the things you love?”

“I did,” Joey said, smiling as he remembered his old Barcalounger and how Rachel broke it, then bought an even better chair that they shared for years.

“Best of luck to you, man,” Derek said.

“Yeah,” Joey called back to him, wondering if they would ever see each other again. “You too. And thanks again, for everything.”

Derek nodded at him, then turned on his heel and went back toward the front doors, toward _his_ new family, leaving Joey walking down the sidewalk by himself, armed with a crude map in one hand and a bat in the other, as the cold light from the half-moon and the street lamps shone down on him.

 

 

 

Phoebe listened to the rain.

It had started up around five that evening, coming down in a thin mist, and had gotten steadier and stronger with every passing hour. It was good for dousing out the fires that had cropped up all over Manhattan, but the flashing lightning and booming cracks of thunder weren't doing Phoebe’s desire for sleep - or Mike - any favors.

Ross had offered his bed to Phoebe for the night, saying that he’d stay up in the living room so he could keep his foot elevated and make sure no zombies came barging in. She’d been hesitant, as he only had a few stone statues around the apartment for weapons, but he said he could manage.

She ended up tossing and turning until nearly midnight, listening to the alternating thunder claps and the tenant upstairs bang around in the apartment until he or she fell silent, and when Phoebe went back out into the living room to see whether Ross was still awake, she found an abandoned sofa, and a note on the apothecary table.

Phoebe slammed open his front door, dreading the possibility that she was too late to catch Ross, that he was probably already long gone, that he was all alone outside.

She caught him hobbling his way to the end of the hall, panting a little and leaning against the wall for support.

The look on his face when he whipped his head back toward her would’ve been comical, if she hadn’t felt like she was having a mild heart attack. It wasn’t until after she dragged him back into his apartment and practically threw him down on his couch that she noticed he was in tears.

“Don’t make me handcuff you to anything,” she warned him. “And don’t pretend you don’t have handcuffs, because now I know where you keep them!”

“Just let me go, Phoebe,” he said in a hoarse, choked voice, his hand on his ankle.

“I’m actually impressed. Be honest, Rachel used them on you, didn't she?”

“You can stay here, if you want,” he said, still ignoring her. “I can go by myself, really.”

She looked down at him, still getting her wind back, but didn’t say anything. Instead, she reached out to check his ankle, but he jerked away from her.

“What were you doing up, anyway? Thought you were sleeping,” he grumbled, twisting himself into an upright position.

“I couldn’t,” she said, dropping down on the far end of the couch. “Thunder kept me up. So did your neighbor.”

He snorted, then set his face in a serious, flat expression. “I’m leaving, Phoebe. You can’t stop me.”

“Well, if I can’t, and our new friends out there can’t, I’m pretty sure the rain will.”

Suddenly, moving with a surprising burst of speed, Ross jumped up off the couch and tried to run around it, to run past her and out the door.

She got up and circled around, cutting off his escape. When he tried stepping to the right, she followed his movements in perfect sync.

“Phoebe, please! Rachel's out there, all alone, and she's got Emma! Okay, she could have gotten herself into, into very real danger right now - I can't just let her be out there, scared out of her mind, with Emma to take care of! She's got worse than no one with her, she's got her _mom_!” 

“Look, I know you’re worried sick about them, and I am too, but I know you, Ross. You’re smart, and you were always one of the few living people I sort of respected... But trust me when I say that you are not going to make it out there.”

“Fine, then come with me,” he said, a desperate edge in his voice.

“Ross, I’ve done a lot of out-there stuff, and that's putting it mildly. You think that marrying the ice dancer, mugging preteen boys, and living on the street was the worst of it? All that stuff’s just at the tip of the iceberg.”

“I don’t have time for this,” he said between clenched teeth.

“My point is, none of the stuff I’ve done comes close to what you’re trying to do. Even if we did manage to get to my cab and get out of the Village, we wouldn’t be able to see anything.”

That seemed to strike a chord in him. She knew Ross was nothing if not practical, and she knew that he knew that she had a point.

Finally, he deflated, and they went back to their original seats on the long couch, collapsing onto their ends at the same time. When Ross drifted off to sleep, Phoebe kept watch on the door.

She would never tell him what she’d heard: the faint sound of shattering glass from the window upstairs, and something tumbling past Ross’s window to land on the street outside.


	4. 3

**October 2, 2006**

Sometime around six the next morning, long after the rain had dissipated, Ross dared to open up his curtains.

Outside, it was a wasteland. Wrecked cars were scattered on the streets, vendors were turned over, bicycles lay twisted and bent over on their sides, and soggy papers clogged up the gutters, leaving what looked to be an inch of rainwater flooding the neighborhood. Multicolored specks stood out here and there, floating along the pavement, proof of just how many cell phones had been in use around four o'clock the previous afternoon. Admist the aftermath of what had happened, Ross couldn’t make out any movement of life. 

 _It’s almost like the whole place was cleaned out_ , he thought. _This must mean they've all gone somewhere else, or died for good._  
  
Then, at the end of the farthest road in Ross's line of sight, one zombie shambled into view, followed by another, and then another. Suddenly there were about thirty of them lumbering about in the street, all of them dripping rainwater as they slogged toward Ross's apartment.

“Or not,” he said, then wrenched the curtains shut again before hobbling back to the couch.

 

 

 

Monica and Chandler knelt together just below their kitchen window, their faces matching sets of horror and fascination. A zombie had plopped himself down in Monica's garden and was tearing up her perfectly organized patch of vegetables.

When the former man in coveralls ripped up something that looked like a turnip, roots and all, Monica shot up, wailing, “My rutabaga!”

Chandler yanked her back down. “What are you doing?” he hissed, glancing at the zombie to see if it had noticed her. It was, to his relief, still fully absorbed in chowing down on the bulb it held in its grimy hand.

She wrenched her arm out of his grasp. “You know how much time I've spent on my garden.”

“Yes, I do,” he said. “But are your vegetables really more important than our lives?”

She fell silent, looking, for a second, like she was seriously contemplating the answer, but she settled for crouching back down, peering out the window again.

“Man, I can’t believe the nerve of these guys," she said. "First they’re eating people left and right, and now they’re going after our food!”

“I’d say that’s a step in the right direction,” Chandler said. “But we shouldn’t be taking any chances."

“Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

A surprised smile spread across Chandler’s face. “Thank you!” Then the smile slid right off when he turned his attention back out the window. “This is  _beyond_ messed up. This is even worse than when I walked in on my dad with the butler. And the pool boy! And the —”

“— _Got it_!” 

Another zombie ambled up to the garden and sat down next to the first one. Both of them helped themselves to a tomato each, the juice and seeds dribbling down their filthy, bloodstained chins.

Monica backed away from the window, though her movement was more controlled, and she stayed low to the ground.

“Okay,” she said a couple times, hugging her sides as she and Chandler quietly went into their living room. “That’s it. I, I can’t take this anymore. We have to get out of here.”

“What?”

“I’m telling you, we can stay here and wait for them to get tired of the garden and start busting down the doors, or go out there, kick some ass, and survive.” 

“What about the kids?”

Monica raised her eyebrows. “I was thinking we could take them with us. Or, y’know, leave ’em here. Whatever.”

Chandler gave her his ‘leave the sarcastic jokes to me’ face. “Come on, Mon; they’re two. What if we can’t make it out there?”

“I think you’re forgetting something,” Monica said. “We’ve got me, and with me, we’re gonna win.”

“Win?” He could only gaze at her in mild shock. “This is a game to you?”

“We can make it one,” Monica said, a devious glint coming into her eyes. “Ten points for every zombie we decapitate, three for the ones we run over with the Porsche.”

“Okay...” Chandler chuckled until he noticed that the glint had not left Monica’s eye. “You're scaring me.” 

Rolling her eyes, Monica started heading upstairs, with Chandler on her heels.

“Honey, you’re not seriously suggesting that we —”

“— I’m not suggesting, I’m _saying_ it,” Monica said, turning around sharply to face him. “Look, we can’t stay in here forever. Who knows how long this thing’s gonna last? Who knows if the army will ever show up like they do in the movies? I think we’re kinda on our own here.”

“And _I_ think you're forgetting that in those movies, there’s usually a group of hot, athletic young people running around with a very large amount of guns. We’ve got two toddlers, no weapons, and I haven’t been to the gym in,” He trailed off as he counted the years with his fingers. “Well, pretty much ever, but my point stands: we are the perfect candidates to die once we go out there. Do you _want_ to see your husband get dismembered?”

The corner of Monica’s mouth turned up a little. “That’s not gonna happen. See, nobody in this family is dying on my watch.”

“All right,” Chandler said, finally relenting. “I mean, I just drank the last Yoo Hoo about an hour ago, so we were gonna need to stock up on those, anyway.”

 

 

 

Joey stood outside Derek and Shane’s house and watched the sun rise, not seeing a single zombie. It was as if the world had been put on pause after dusk, as if the zombies had all gone somewhere else for naptime. That thought alone was bizarre, but, Joey figured, if this was the end of the world, all bets on logic were off.

He had no problem with that.

Which was why, after he caught a few hours of sleep, he made a dozen sandwiches, ate a couple, packed a couple, then ate some more. He found a can of spray paint in the closet and remembered to mark highway signs for Derek, so he took the can too.

He made his way into the garage, a bag and Derek's shotgun slung over his shoulder. Joey had left his bat propped against the front door, leaving it unlocked, knowing both signs would tell Derek and Shane that - if they ever went home - Joey had been there.

He stopped when he got to the bottom of the steps in the garage as his eyes fell on a motorcycle. He didn’t know much about them, but he knew how to drive one. It was another skill he’d had to learn soon after landing a part, only that time it was for a minor role - which is what Joey preferred to think instead of 'stunt double.' 

He went up to the bike and ran his hand along it, admiring the shiny metal, and noticed a helmet resting on the seat. When Joey looked in the helmet, he found two gloves, and, without pausing to think about what he was doing, he put the gear on. If Derek was willing to part with his shotgun, he probably wouldn’t mind if Joey took his - or Shane's - bike.

Probably.

As Joey settled himself on the seat and admired himself in the rearview mirror, he was suddenly struck with the thought that things were working out a little _too_  good for him. He was getting way too lucky.

Maybe, sooner or later, his luck would eventually run out.

When he looked at an old bookcase that was sitting right in front of him, he saw a key sitting on the lower shelf that he knew, without a doubt, belonged to the bike.

_Luck, schmuck,_ he thought as he grabbed the key.  Besides, he might as well enjoy the ride back home.

 

 

  
“Since when do you know how to treat a sprained ankle?” Ross asked Phoebe as she finished bandaging up his ankle.

“Masseuses learn all about pressure points and how to deal with injuries,” she said, then stood up. “I should make some tea while we still have running water. You’ve got tea, right?”

“Yeah, in the kitchen cabinet next to the fridge. And hey, I can’t even remember if I said this before, but... Thanks, Pheebs,” Ross said as he looked up at her. “For everything. I always thought you’d be the death of me, but, well, you are my rock.”

“I thought that I'm your  _star_ ,” she said, tilting her head.

“Potato, potahto.”

To her own surprise, Phoebe actually laughed at that, then went into the kitchen.

When she came back out later with two steaming mugs, she asked, “What do you think happened to Gunther? I didn’t see him in Central Perk when we were down there earlier. Do you think he’s one of... _them_ now?”

Ross shrugged one shoulder. “If he made it, great. If not, too bad for him.”

“It’d really be a crime against nature if he got turned into a zombie. Somebody that gorgeous becoming evil and gross?” Phoebe shuddered at the thought.

“Gunther's not exactly on my priority list of people to worry about,” Ross admitted.  “I mean, aside from the others, how do you think, say, Frank and his family are holding up?”

Phoebe chewed on her lip before responding. “Actually, it’s Alice I’m worried about, but I think they’ll manage. What about Carol, Susan and Ben?” 

“They went up to Susan's cousin’s house upstate. God, I wish I’d said more to Ben before he left. He must be terrified right now.”

“They’ll probably head back after laying low for a while,” Phoebe assured him. “I mean, having an ass that won’t quit isn’t the only thing Carol’s got going for her.”

“I know,” Ross said, then took a sip of his tea after blowing on it. He swallowed, then brightened a bit. “Hey, this is pretty good!”

“That's nice to know, because I gave it to you in March. Remember when you and Rachel said you’d try it out the next day? I found it way in the back of the cupboard, behind a bag of chips that expired six weeks ago.”

“I _knew_ Rachel was lying about throwing it away!” Ross said. When he noticed Phoebe looking at him, he added, “Don’t know _how_ your tea ended up there, though,” before taking a long gulp from his cup.

“Uh huh.”

“So,” he said hastily, “what about Ursula?”

Phoebe couldn’t hold back the bite in her tone when she asked, “What _about_ her?”

“It's just, I mean, you’ve got that whole..." Ross waved his free hand in the air. " _Twin_  thing going on, so you should know if she’s fine or not.”

Phoebe scoffed at that. “I may be psychic and able to tell the future, Ross, but I don’t have some sort of weird mental link with my sister.” She didn't mention, however, the scattered dreams she had of Ursula earlier that morning: she'd been walking toward Phoebe with her arms stretched out, her flesh decaying, and saying happily, "You should try this out, you know. It's a lot more fun than you think!" 

“Okay,” Ross said, looking a little confused when Phoebe shuddered. “But don’t you want to try checking up on her before we leave? It might be worth a shot.”

Tilting her head to one side and staving off another shudder, Phoebe considered his suggestion. 

 

> **December 2003**
> 
> When Ursula opened the door and found her sister standing out in the hall, she already seemed bored.
> 
> “Hi,” Phoebe said, mustering up the courage to speak first. “So, um, I’m getting married next week.” She raised her left hand to show off her ring, and couldn’t contain her excitement. “Yay! And I was wondering if you wanted to come to the wedding.”
> 
> Ursula leaned against the doorway, her arms crossed over her chest. She’d nodded along, listening to Phoebe, then said, “Yeah, I can’t make it.” 
> 
> Though Phoebe knew she should have seen the rejection coming, her face fell. “Oh. Well, do you really have other plans that might be more important than this? Because, I mean, it’s _only_ the wedding of the century, and I actually wouldn't mind it if you'd come.” 
> 
> Ursula unfolded her arms and pushed herself upright, an indecipherable expression on her face. For a moment, Phoebe wondered if —
> 
> “Look, um... Phoebe,” Ursula said, “I'm flattered, but I've really gotta get my teeth cleaned, and I don't know for sure, but it'll probably be on whichever day you're getting married.”
> 
> “Ursula,” Phoebe said, on the brink of tearing up and hating herself for it. “It’s my  _wedding_.”
> 
> “Okay, fine!” Ursula said impatiently, side-stepping the door. “I'll send you an X-Ray. Bye bye, now.”
> 
> When the door slammed shut in Phoebe’s face, she bit her lip and, for a second, considered letting all of her pent up fury out on Ursula, yelling at her to go screw herself, but she realized that in the end, Ursula wasn’t worth it.
> 
>  

“Yeah, that's not gonna happen,” Phoebe said to Ross. “Ursula can, y'know, kinda drop dead, for all I care.”

 

 

  
In the garage, Monica and Chandler settled in the Porsche, after buckling in the kids. They went over their plan of going to see Monica’s parents to the town north of them, ran through the checklist of things they had in the car, and intertwined their fingers above the gearshift.

“Ready?” Monica asked.

“Actually, I think we’re good right here,” Chandler said in a conversational tone, and Monica grinned.

“I love you,” she said.

“Love you more.”

She raised one eyebrow. “Honey? Just between you and me, I think that one’s always gonna be a tie.”

They both leaned forward and shared a long, slow kiss.

After separating, Monica announced, “All right, everyone, let’s _roll_!” and pressed her foot on the gas pedal a few seconds after Chandler clicked the button that opened the garage door.

 

 

 

Rachel awoke with a start, her heart beating double time when she rolled over in bed and saw that her daughter was missing.

She ran around the house in a frenzy, calling out for Emma, desperate to find her without trying to draw any zombies to the house by screaming bloody murder. She was back in the bedroom, already shedding tears out of fear and worry, when she heard Emma laughing.

Rachel froze. It sounded like Emma was outside. It sounded like she was… 

Rachel bolted up to the attic, and she let out a sob when she found Emma happily sitting on the roof.

“What are you _doing_?” she shrieked.

“Playing with the funny people,” Emma explained, then put a finger to her lips. “Shh, they're sleeping!” 

Rachel looked down, and gasped when she saw a couple of corpses lying twitching and groaning in a heap up against the outer wall of Sandra’s house. A pile of red tiles and dust covered them.

Rachel looked back at Emma.

“ _You_ did all of that?” she asked, remembering to keep her voice lowered.

“Yup,” Emma said, heaving another large, broken tile she’d been holding over the edge of the roof, like she was already bored with the game she’d been playing with her new monstrous friends.

Rachel opened her mouth as she stared at her daughter. She closed her mouth, then opened it again.

“Can I have cereal?” Emma asked.

After she found her voice again, Rachel said, “Yeah, why not.”

 

   
  

As Monica pulled up to her parents’ home, Chandler looked out the passenger window.

What seemed odder than everything else was that he’d noticed, on the way over, that there weren’t any bodies – actual dead bodies – around. At first it had given him a bit of relief at being spared of what would have been sickening sights and smells, but at the same time, the thought of zombies dragging all the bodies away made him feel uneasy. He didn’t quite know why yet, but he just knew he didn’t like the thought of zombies cleaning up after themselves.

His thoughts about janitor zombies scattered when he realized Monica was talking.

“Okay, you’ve gotta make this fast. In and out in three minutes or less.”

“Why do you look so worried?” he asked. “You know I'm capable of doing that, and _only_ when the situation calls for it.”

“Because in case you haven’t noticed, there are still a bunch of those things roaming around out here! Okay, what if they come up to the car while you’re gone?”

Chandler blanched at that. “I’ll set a new record,” he said, kissing Monica's cheek before jumping out of the car.

He ended up fulfilling his promise, making it back in less than a minute, but without Monica’s parents. He looked at her hands when he got in the car. They were clenched so tightly around the wheel, he wondered how it hadn’t snapped apart under her grip.

“Sorry,” he offered, panting a little as he shut the passenger door behind himself. “The front door was unlocked, but no one was there. I didn’t see any bodies, though.”

When Monica only seemed to get worse, he put his hand over one of hers, and added, “Don’t worry. I’m sure they’re all right.”

“Oh, God,” she said, breathing more rapidly as she rocked back and forth in her seat. “Maybe they were using their cell phones yesterday, maybe they —”

“— Monica, honey, listen to me,” Chandler said quietly, and he exhaled in relief when she turned to face him. “Remember when your dad dropped his cell in the grill two months ago? And Judy’s probably with him right now. See, her car’s not there. They must be on their way to Manhattan.”

“Manhattan?” Monica stilled her erratic movements. “Why wouldn’t they go to our place first? We’re closer!”

Sensing his chance, Chandler grabbed onto it, taking the hand he’d placed over Monica’s and putting it on her arm. “Probably because they want to make sure their firstborn child is okay.”

“Well, I’m just as important!” Monica said, but at least she wasn’t shaking anymore. “I can’t believe they would just skip over me like that!”

“See? So I think we should head over there, too.”

“Y’know, Ross never was a medical marvel,” Monica muttered. “Mom just told him that when he got second place in a spelling bee.”

Erica started stirring at that point, and, after checking her with a quick glance, Chandler said, “Your dad didn’t happen to keep a secret stash of guns in his study, did he?”

“No,” Monica said, still sulking a little. A second later, she perked up. “But Richard has a rifle in his. And he moved in two doors down, remember?”

Chandler’s mouth twisted at that. “Yes, I remember because I keep an extremely close, detailed record of that man’s _every_ waking move.”

“Always knew you had a thing for him,” Monica said as she opened the door. “Start counting, because I’m going to break your record now.”

 

 

 

After Rachel fed her daughter, she figured out what she had to do.

Then she curled up with Emma on the couch in the living room, and read her a story. It was one of the books she’d found in her bedroom upstairs, and she read it in a low, soothing tone, savoring the calm before the inevitable storm.

>  
> 
> **October 2005**

> When Rachel opened the bag of books Ross brought back from the store, she was less than thrilled with the collection of dinosaur stories she saw. She threw him a disapproving look when she pulled out the third one, which didn't even look like a book.
> 
> “Seriously, Ross?” she said, holding it up. The front had a simple drawing of a sad dinosaur, with a hastily scribbled title: “All My Friends Are Dead.”
> 
> “It’s an educational story!” he said as he raised his voice in defense.
> 
> Rachel raised her eyebrows.
> 
> “Or it's a rough draft a couple of my students are working on, and they kept pestering me to read it,” he amended. “Come on, Rach, we could use it to help Emma understand the meaning of death. She's gonna find out about it sooner or later.”
> 
> “Through a _book_?” Rachel snapped.
> 
> “Well, if you think that’s a bad idea, we could always bring people in and _murder_ them in front of her.”
> 
> Rachel shook her head, resigning herself to keeping the book. She peered into the bag again, pulled out a couple more Pop Up books, then a large, regular one with a recognizable cover.
> 
> “Oh, the Places You'll Go!”
> 
> Something about the book reminded her of someone from a long, long time ago. She shelved the book along with the faded memory, but it kept cropping up throughout the rest of the day, and the next. Maybe her father had read it to her when she was a kid? No, Dr. Green never had time to read books to her, and Sandra never had any desire to do that, so the nanny always read to Rachel.
> 
> Maybe she had received it as a birthday present?
> 
> And then, when she was settling in bed with Ross a few nights later, she remembered.
> 
> Joey had gotten the book for her, on the same night she’d gotten the pin and found out Ross was in love with her.
> 
> The next evening, after she got back from work, she read the story with Emma, and as she read, she thought about Paris.
> 
> _Oh! The Places You’ll Go…_
> 
> “Mommy, why'd you stop? More!”
> 
> She took a second to realize she'd trailed off in the middle of reading, and her daughter was looking up at her expectantly.
> 
> Rachel blinked her tears back and said, “Okay, honey. Where were we?”

 

“Mommy, why'd you stop? What's wrong?”

Rachel switched her focus from the Dr. Seuss book to her daughter’s concerned, big blue eyes. She sighed, ready to wave everything away with a lie, to put her little girl at ease.

When she opened her mouth, she said, “Well... probably the fact that my mom isn't here to make everything instantly better. Not to mention all the dead people walking around outside, and I don't even wanna  _think_ about the possibility that my friends, your aunts and uncles, might be out there, just like them. I have no idea what I'm doing, and I'm terrified of what could happen to us when we leave, but I know we have to.” Rachel paused before continuing.  “And then there's all the stuff that's been going on between me and your father, ever since... I miss him, Emma, I really do, but I think I - I think your dad and I made a mistake. Another mistake in a long, long list of 'em. So yeah, that's pretty much everything that's wrong.” 

When she was done with the tirade, with her emotional waterfall, Emma blinked a few times and said, “Huh?”

Rachel blinked right back at Emma. “Okay, maybe we’ll give it another five to ten years.”

 

 

 

Chandler had gotten in the driver’s seat and moved the car down to Richard’s house after a minute ticked by. He let out a sigh of relief when Monica finally emerged from the house with a rifle, then started shouting when a handful of zombies jumped out from behind the house and started running – no, they couldn’t run, they  _couldn’t_ – after her.

His shouts got louder, and the twins joined in when Monica slammed against the passenger seat’s door, but instead of getting in, she whirled around, raised the rifle up to her shoulder, and took aim into the swiftly approaching crowd.

Chandler couldn’t even understand what he was saying anymore, he was so rattled, and he was still yelling after four of the five zombies were sprawled out on the lawn in front of Richard’s house. She opened the door and shut it behind herself, and he wouldn’t stop shouting nonsense words until she reached over and turned the key in the ignition for him.

“Less yelling, more driving!” she hollered at him, which finally set him into motion. He managed to speed away before the last zombie could latch onto the back of the Porsche.

He made it a few blocks away before his nerves settled into place, and glanced at Monica while she was leaning toward the backseat, calming the twins.

“I didn’t know you could use a gun.”

“Thanks for joining us,” she said.

“I could say the same for you. Look, what you did back there was probably the hottest thing I have ever seen, but do me a favor and _never_ do it again.”

“I wish I could say I won’t, but sorry,” Monica said as the twins’ cries subsided and she twisted around to face the road. “Can’t make any promises.”

Chandler didn’t know whether he was relieved or frustrated to hear her say that. He settled for changing the subject. “Getting back to the gun thing…”

“Well, for about a year while I was in college, I went to a shooting range whenever I felt really stressed out,” Monica explained as she shifted the rifle around on her lap. “It was kinda my way of experimenting.”

“Huh. Not exactly the kind of experimenting I always pictured, but definitely more helpful to us now.”

“ _I know_!”

“So,” Chandler said. “I guess we’re going back to The Village?”

“Yeah.”

“No time like the present for a reunion. You’ve got the safety on now, right?”

“Yeah.” After a moment’s pause, Monica added. “I don’t want to freak you out again, but I’m gonna need to take it off.”

“Your shirt? Why?”

“ _The safety_ , Chandler,” she said in a very strained voice, and this time he found himself squeezing the wheel in a death grip, desperately wishing she'd been referring to her shirt.

“How many are behind us?” he asked, refusing to look directly up at the rearview mirror.

“About ten and... Well, if I'm being generous, three quarters.”

He shifted the gear in response. He was just about to say that he was getting used to this whole survival thing, when he saw, up ahead on the main road, a couple of wrecked cars that would be impossible to swerve around. There was a side street to the left just before the accident, and he had no choice but to take it.

“Don’t use up all your ammo yet,” he said, getting ready to make the turn. “Hang on!”

As he put all of his energy into his arm and swerved the car to the left, as he caught the sight of the small army of shambling, bloody corpses that were gaining on the Porsche, all Chandler could think of was that he wished Joey could see him now.

 

 

 

“I hope you’re okay, Mom,” Rachel murmured as she placed the Post-it note she’d written to Sandra on the front door. If her mother came back and found it, she’d know where to find Rachel.

Rachel had ended up waiting around and packing until dusk to leave, occasionally napping and peeking out the window when she was feeling brave. As the day had drawn to a close, she noticed less and less zombies groaning and stumbling about with each passing hour on the streets. When the sunlight began to dim, all movement outside, alive or dead, had come to a complete halt. It was as if they’d all gone somewhere else.

The question niggling at the back of Rachel’s mind was _where_ they had gone, but she shoved it to the back of her mind, forcing herself to focus on getting herself and her daughter back to The Village.

“Next stop, home,” she said to Emma, when they were both settled themselves in Sandra’s car again, and, with a renewed sense of purpose, Rachel started driving.

Little did she know, it was in the wrong direction.

 

 

 

“You know,” Ross said, flexing his foot under Phoebe’s supervision, “when I was acting out on account of my rage, my psychiatrist gave me a pill to calm me down. Maybe we could do the same to the zombies.”

Phoebe turned to look at him. “Oh, that’s a _great_ idea! Okay, you go outside, hold them down, and keep their mouths open long enough for me to drop a bunch of pills down their throats.” Unlike how Chandler would have sounded, Phoebe was completely serious.

Ross snorted. “I didn’t say we should do something that stupid.”

“Then what?” Phoebe asked, her face scrunching in confusion. “Giving them a suppository would be _twice_ as —”

“— No, I’m saying we could shoot them with it. Like tranquilizing a bear, or something.”

“Ooh, or a giraffe! Not many people know this, but they could pose a _huge_ threat to society.”

Ross narrowed his eyes. “Right, because rampaging giraffes are what we really should be worrying about right now.”

“Do you think we’re ever gonna be able to recover from this?” she asked after a few seconds of silence went by. “And by ‘we’, I don’t just mean you and me.”

“You seem to be handling this just fine,” he pointed out. “I guess as long as we’ve got people like you around, humanity should be okay.”

“That is true. I _have_ been holding up considerably well under all this pressure.” Phoebe tapped Ross’s leg to signal him to stop flexing his foot, and he relaxed as she continued. “Chandler’s the same way. After me, he’s had the most screwed-up childhood out of all of us. He’s probably having a blast right now, making jokes left and right about these things.”

“Yeah,” Ross said. “Poor Mon.”

 

 

 

“Monica,” Chandler said, filing away his next ten zombie jokes for the moment, “this is the third time we've been on this street. I think we’re stuck.”

She smacked one of her palms on the steering wheel in frustration. “We are not stuck! I just need to figure out another way to get out of this damn neighborhood.”

“Okay, well, we can’t stay in here forever. Sleeping in the car was fun for one… hour and a half last night, but we should start looking for a place to stay.”

She shifted her gaze over to him as she slowed the car even more. “Are you saying we should break into someone’s house and stay there?”

“Well, I was gonna suggest the Ritz, but that’s probably somewhere past Carsapalooza.”

“Fine,” Monica said as she pulled over onto the side of the street next to a blue, two-story house. “I’ll check if this one’s empty.”

“No, it’s okay. I’ll go look.”

Monica unbuckled her seatbelt and rubbed her neck. “I thought we’d be in the city by now.”

“Me too,” Chandler said. "Don't worry; we'll get there soon.

"I hope," he added to himself as he began walking up to the house.

 

 

  
Rachel ran on dangerously low batteries as she made her way back to the city.

She was so tired that her level of fatigue had come all the way back around to anxious awareness and a buzzing kind of clarity.

Back when she first brought Emma home from the hospital, she’d wondered if she would ever get a full night’s sleep again. In her present state, she was wondering if she’d ever be able to get through five minutes’ worth of absolute rest without snapping wide awake and checking on her child.

It would’ve already been slow going for her if she’d been by herself, but it was much, much slower with someone else to take care of. After driving for what felt like hours and having to backtrack and go down smaller roads because of all the accidents on the main ones, Rachel pulled over, next to a line of trees. She dozed for a while, jerking her head up every now and then to stay alert for any loud, sudden movements. She wouldn’t look at her entire face in the rearview mirrors because she was afraid she’d faint at seeing her own haunted reflection.

As she shivered and reluctantly turned on the heater, she shifted around in her seat. She knew she should be missing Ross, and she did miss him, but in a distant sort of way.

More than anything, she wanted Joey next to her, so he could put his arms around her and make her feel safe, make her laugh, and, above all else, make her forget, just for a moment, that any of this was happening.

"Hope you get here soon, Joe," she murmured to thin air. "And you better not be letting anyone, dead or alive, slow you down." 

 

 

  
Still riding Derek's motorcycle, Joey eased up on the gas when he saw someone on the sidewalk in the middle of an otherwise eerily empty town, walking toward him as the sun went down behind him. He didn't want to stop, since he was already making such good time, but it had been more than a day since he'd had human contact, and when he drew closer to the person, he saw that it was an extremely attractive woman. She even smelled nice. At least the apocalypse hadn't wiped out all the hot people, which came as a relief to him.

He managed to come to a stop without toppling over, and put down the kickstand.

The woman looked shocked for a second, then smiled. “Hey, there, stranger.”

“Hi,” Joey said as he removed his helmet. “You happen to have someplace around here that has —”

The rest of his words died in his throat when he did a double take at the woman.

“Long time, no see,” Kate said with a grin.

Joey nearly fell on his face dismounting the bike, he was so shocked.

Chuckling a little, Kate pulled him to his feet and handed him back his helmet. “Still the same Joey. Come on, we should get out of here. I haven't seen any in about an hour, but they probably heard your engine. What'd you say you're looking for?”

“Hardware store would be good.” He was too shocked to be shocked about remembering to get more spray paint, since he'd been marking the signs with the words ‘J wuz here,’ for Derek and his group.

Not that any of that mattered, because he was still processing what was going on.

“C'mon,” Kate - the first woman Joey Tribbani ever had feelings, _real_ feelings for - said, grabbing onto his hand and dragging him away from his bike. He gripped onto his shotgun and helmet with his free hand, remembering his promise to Derek.

They dashed across the street, weaving past crashed cars and practically skipping over large bloodstains on the street. Joey couldn't help but feel giddy, his hand in Kate's, and she let out a little laugh as she led him to a small, abandoned store called DIY Repairs. 

She checked the door, then they went through it, panting and still clinging to each other, and when Joey finally managed to get half his wits about him - most of them in a very specific region in his body - Kate was pressing him up against the wall, her wild hair tickling his face. 

Joey licked his own lips, unable to take his eyes away from hers.

“This can't just be a coincidence, can it?” she asked, breathless and soft and _clean_ , and somehow even more beautiful than she was the last time Joey saw her. “I mean, of all the places to see you again... Thought I was the only one left alive in this place, after the film crew started eating each other and then swarmed anything with a motor. Was gonna try to make it out on foot before I saw you coming, so I thought I should wait. Best decision I ever made, right?” 

For a moment, caught up in the now and with her hands on him, he was ready and willing to forget everything that was going on around him, to get lost in what he did best, and to enjoy himself a little, especially with the woman he'd let go years ago. 

“Look, I'm just as surprised as you are, to see you after all this time,” Kate said, leaning in close and murmuring against his neck. “But hey, maybe this was supposed to happen. World's ending, you know, and we're here, together again. We can finally finish what we started. I mean, it's not like you've got anywhere else to be, right?”

Joey looked at her.

A moment ticked by, then another.

“Joey?” Kate asked.

 

> **May 2004**
> 
> “Joey?” Rachel called out to him, and he didn't say anything as he joined her out on the balcony.
> 
> At first, he turned his head away from her and crossed his arms stubbornly across his chest. Not because he was mad at her, but because that was what he did when people left him. He just hoped she wouldn’t cry. He always hated seeing her cry.
> 
> “Joey,” she said slowly, holding out both of her hands and waiting for him to take them. “Sweetie... Come here.”
> 
> When he did, she drew him close to her. She said a lot of things to him, and it wasn't that he wasn't listening. It was just that, once he met her eyes, he just couldn't stop looking at her.
> 
> He was going to miss her so much.
> 
> He only managed to tune in right when she put her hands up on his shoulders, and said, “You wanna know something? You were my favorite roommate.”
> 
> “Really?” he asked, wondering if she'd gotten him mixed up with Monica. It wouldn't be the first time she did, especially whenever he cooked.
> 
> “Yeah! I mean, everyone else has been great to live with, and I love them, but... I had so much fun with you. All the time.”
> 
> Joey brought one of his hands up to start stroking her arm.
> 
> “You’ve been so great with me and Emma, and, I guess… Well, I always felt like things just _worked_ between us when I was living with you. You know, I hated that apartment when Monica and I had to live there, but with you, it really felt like home.”
> 
> He nodded, understanding exactly how she felt.
> 
> “Thank you for… everything,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper. “I’ll always remember how much fun we had together, Joey. I love you so much, and I’m really gonna miss you.”
> 
> When he started to jump off the balcony, he figured that it really wasn’t such a bad way to go: thinking about Rachel and knowing that, no matter what had happened between them, he still held a place in her heart.
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> **July 2004**
> 
> When Joey went into Central Perk, Ross and Rachel greeted him from their spot on the group’s couch. He smiled at them as he made his way to the sofa adjacent to the couch.
> 
> “So,” Rachel said. “Candice was nice. How was your date?”
> 
> Joey started fidgeting under her curious look. “Oh,” he said. “Yeah, it didn’t go so well.”
> 
> “What?” Ross asked. “I ran into her here this morning. She said you had a pretty good time together.” 
> 
> Joey shrugged. “Okay, so it didn’t _suck_.”
> 
> “So, I take it that you’re going to go against what you’ve always done and actually call this one back?” Rachel asked as she examined her nails.
> 
> “Nah,” Joey admitted. “She's not... really my type, anyway.”
> 
> “What, are you kidding?” Ross said. “She was nice, she was funny, and did you get a load of her —”
> 
> Rachel cleared her throat as she turned and glared at Ross.
> 
> “Totally mature and sophisticated personality, is what I was about to say.”
> 
> “Yeah, sure,” Joey said as he shifted in his seat. “It’s just… I don’t know. I didn’t really feel anything between us. But that’s okay, ’cause I’ve got another date lined up for tomorrow night.” _And the night after that… and the night after that_ , he added to himself. 
> 
> “Well,” Ross said, crossing his fingers. “Here’s hoping she’s The One!”
> 
> “Yeah,” Joey said, offering his friends another small smile. “Or at least The One for More Than A Day, anyway.”
> 
> “There you go!” Ross said, beaming as Rachel rolled her eyes.
> 
> That night, Joey got a call from an agent in Los Angeles. 
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> **September 2006**
> 
> “Oh, good,” Joey’s agent said when he walked into her office. “You’re here. Sit.”
> 
> He chose to remain standing. “So, is this about a new role, or something? Because you wouldn’t have asked me to come over if it wasn’t something really important.”
> 
> “Look, you should really be sitting down for this,” she said.
> 
> “No way! I got things to see, people to do, and awesome to... be. So make it quick, all right?”
> 
> She raised an eyebrow at him. “At least you act like you should be in a blockbuster.”
> 
> “Are you kidding me? I got a part in one?” Joey said, already bursting with pride before she could get a word in edgewise. “That's great! Too great for me to waste time standing around in some stuffy office, so just tell me where they're shooting, and I’ll be all set to —”
> 
> “—Your show was cancelled.”
> 
> Joey sat down right in the chair across from his agent’s desk.  “What?” he cried. “How come?”
> 
> She pursed her lips, sighing and looking away from him. “Not enough viewers,” she said. “I’m sorry.” She sure didn't sound like it.
> 
> “But we were doing so good last year,” he said. “We got a picture in  _TV Guide_  and everything.”
> 
> “Well, you know how fickle television audiences can be.” His agent’s cell phone rang, and she opened it. “Yeah?” she said, clearly not interested in talking to Joey anymore.
> 
> Joey slumped in his chair. He’d come out here for the better acting opportunities, not to end up with the same sort of thing that happened to  _Mac and C.H.E.E.S.E_. and  _Shutterspeed_. He thought things would turn out differently for him here.
> 
> “This sucks,” he grumbled, more to himself than to his agent, who was deep in conversation with the person on the other line. “L.A. sucks.”
> 
> She turned to him, then put her hand on the mouth’s end of the receiver.
> 
> “You’re still here?” she asked. “Go! I’ll send you a script if I get one, but I can't make any promises."
> 
> "What am I supposed to do now?"
> 
> "Well, why don't you go see those sights, be awesome, go get laid. Do whatever or whoever you want, just do them somewhere else!”
> 
> He sighed, wondering whether to tell her he’d been waiting around all day to be asked to come in the office, and that he had nothing else to do, but she didn't look like she cared, anyway.
> 
> Joey exited the building, hating the whole world. He kicked a can in anger, then yelled when it bounced against the far alley wall and hit him in the knee.
> 
> It was funny, in a not-so-funny way, how he’d been at the height of his career in one second, then back at the bottom in the next.
> 
> _Go get laid._  That’s what his agent had advised him to do. 
> 
> So he did. And again, and again, until Joey realized he didn't really want to anymore. It wasn't enough to ease his growing sense of loneliness and disappointment, which Joey felt more about himself than L.A. 
> 
> More than anything, he wanted to see his friends again. They'd all cheer him up in their own little ways: Chandler would make fun of whoever canceled the show, Ross would say something sciency to bore Joey's disappointment away, Monica would make him a pan of lasagna, Phoebe would sing him one of his favorite songs, “Fuck You, Hollywood!!!” and Rachel would tell him, "Oh, sweetie, you'll find something even better, I know you will," and hug him until he'd forget why he was so upset.
> 
> Joey went home alone for several nights, without any real reason why. He told everyone in New York City about his show getting canceled, feeling a bit better after their conversations.
> 
> And then, Joey started to wonder what he was even doing all the way across the country, anyway.
> 
> Two weeks later, Rachel called him, and she was in tears. 

 

 

“Hello? Earth to Joey?” Kate said impatiently. “Look, if you're gonna stare into space for another five minutes, could you let me know?”

Joey looked down at Kate, shaking his head a little as he snapped back to the present. He gently took Kate's hands in his, and put them down.

“What are you doing?” she said, sounding more shocked than how he'd felt when he saw her on the street. “Are you Joey's secret twin, and you don't know who I am?”

“I know who you are,” Joey said as he leaned down to pick up his helmet. “I'm going home, Kate. I've gotta get to my friends. If you want to come with me, we need to find some spray paint and get you a weapon.” 

It was Kate's turn to be speechless as Joey searched around in the tiny, dusty store. He grabbed a couple cans of spray paint and tossed them, along with some candy bars and water, into a plastic bag.

Finally, when Kate spoke up, she said, “What, that's it?” 

Joey turned to look at her for a moment.

“Yeah, you're right,” he said, then shoved a few more candy bars into the bag.

“No!” Kate brushed her hair out of her face. “I meant your total non-reaction back there. You felt something, I know you did.” 

“Yeah, I did.” Joey shook his plastic bag with a little more force than he should have, before he turned to face her and added, “Years ago. But you left, and you never called. We haven't talked in years, Kate. Why is that? And how come it only took a week and a chick for me to get over you so quickly?”

“Wow,” Kate scoffed, but she clearly looked hurt. “I knew you were fast, Joey, but not  _that_  fast.”

A few seconds ticked by until Joey got what she meant. “No, no, no, it wasn't like that, it was a baby chicken.”

“Ookay,” Kate said as she backed away from Joey.

“What,  _no_! It wasn't like that, either!” Joey sighed. “All I'm sayin’ is, yeah, maybe us running into each other in the middle of all this means something. But don't you think, maybe us never keeping in touch also means something?”

Kate tilted her head to one side, considering what he'd just told her. When she looked back at him, she said, “You're in love with someone else, aren't you?”

Joey squared his jaw and brushed past Kate to look at wrenches that were hanging on the wall. “That doesn't matter anymore,” he said before picking a huge wrench and handing it to Kate.

She took it and tested out its weight. “Joey Tribbiani,” she said, then looked back at him with a small smile. “If I thought you were ever capable of growing up this much, I probably would have stayed in New York for you.” 

Joey paused. Almost ten years ago, he would have done anything to hear her say that.

“You really sure that would've been such a good idea?” he asked, and pushed the door open, then waited for her to follow him out the store.

She stood there, then said, “No,” before joining him outside. “Getting out of the play scene in New York was the best thing I ever did for myself. I mean, before everything turned into a mess, I was having the time of my —”

“— FREEZE!” Someone yelled at them from the street.

Both Joey and Kate whirled toward the source of the noise, Kate brandishing her wrench, and Joey his plastic bag and helmet, completely forgetting his shotgun.

“DROP YOUR WEAPONS!”

They did.

A small group of soldier were huddled around a Humvee, pointing guns at Kate and Joey. The man who had been shouting at them motioned his gun at them.

“Raise your hands and come over here. Nice and easy, now.”

“Joey,” Kate said as they raised their hands in the air and began walking toward the soldiers. “Whatever happens, I just wanted you to know... I really liked you.”

“Yeah,” he said regretfully, “me too.”

“But if it's any consolation, I didn't love you.” 

“Yeah,” he said, much less regretfully. “Me too.”

 

 

 

Chandler felt like he was right at home in the abandoned house. After he fed the twins and settled them in the master bedroom upstairs, he went down to the living room, where Monica was, of course, inspecting the furniture.

“Jack and Erica are okay,” he said. “We should switch off on keeping watch down here, with the rifle.” He wanted to crash on the couch as soon as possible, but offered to stay up first and let Monica sleep.

“Nah,” she said, still occupied with the coffee table in front of the couch. “Get some rest.” She slid her index finger along the wooden border of the table, and made a disapproving sound when she looked at her fingertip. “Don’t know how you could, though, in this pigsty. Our place is  _so_  much cleaner than this.”

Chandler looked around the room, which he’d thought, upon arrival, was spotless, but he knew better than to get into an argument about cleanliness with Monica. Instead, he said, “Honey, I’d take a cardboard box right now, I’m that exhausted.”

“Oh, man,” Monica wailed as a thought had apparently occurred to her. “You know what this means, right? Some people are probably going to break into  _our_  home and mess everything up!”

“Yes, in this situation that truly is the worst thing that could ever happen,” Chandler said. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go pass out.”

When he settled himself on the long couch, his brain wouldn’t let him to go sleep. Either that, or Monica’s constant movement around the living room, then the kitchen, kept him awake. He turned over on the couch, trying to will himself to give into his body’s exhaustion, and when he finally started to doze, he thought about what it had been like when he’d first moved into the suburbs. It had been so  _different_ , living away from all the street noises, the occasional screaming drunkard, and crazy night drivers honking away. Not to mention that he didn't have to deal with Joey or the others coming in through the front door at all hours, like old times. 

He thought he wouldn’t miss any of that. He really did. During his first night in the house, he slept like a baby – well, up until two in the morning, when the actual babies in the house woke him up – but after that, the silence of his neighborhood had started to bother him.

The  _silence_.

Chandler’s eyes snapped open.

“That’s it,” he said, then jumped up off the couch, nearly tripping over his own feet in the process.

He found Monica in the kitchen, her back to him as she scrubbed the floor. He took a second to stop and admire the view, then remembered to focus.

When he called her name, she whirled around on him.

“Chandler, you should know better than to sneak up on me like that! Especially at a time like this. I could’ve —”

“—  _Sponged_  me to death?” he asked. “Okay, I’m sorry, but I wanted to ask you something.”

“What’s up?”

“Have you heard anything since the sun went down? Or seen any of our... jogging buddies?”

“No.” Monica turned back to the tile she’d been cleaning, and Chandler reached out to grip her shoulder.

“Come look out the window,” he said. She hesitated for a moment, then went with him, though she didn't take off her gloves.

He pulled the curtain aside when they walked up to the large window in the living room. Monica peered out at the street.

“What am I supposed to be looking at?” she asked.

“That’s just it,” Chandler said, growing surer of his new theory. “No zombies. Haven’t you noticed how quiet it is?”

She cocked her head to one side. “Not really. So, you’re saying that…”

“Yeah,” Chandler said. “Looks like we’re not the only ones who need our beauty sleep.”

She smiled at him a little. “Nice work, detective. Ross would be proud.”

“I only hope he’s figured out the same thing.” Chandler leaned against the sill as he held the curtain aside, then froze.

“What is it?”

He pressed his ear to the glass. Sure enough, he  _did_ hear something.

“We might have to revoke my badge,” he whispered. “Listen.”

She followed suit, turning her head to lean her ear next to the window, but not touching it.

“Yeah,” she said. “It’s far away, but I’m pretty sure it’s music.”

They pulled their heads away from the window, and Chandler let the curtain swing back over it.

“This whole thing just gets weirder by the minute,” Monica muttered. “You really should get some sleep. If those things out there are recharging, one of us should be doing the same.”

 

 

 

The Humvee rolled to a stop, and Joey cut the engine on Derek's motorcycle. 

Kate jumped out of the back of the Humvee and stopped at Joey's side as he dismounted.

“Look, I know you really care about your friends,” she said, “and I'm pretty sure one of them is a big reason why you're gonna risk your life going halfway across the country, but...” She put her hand on his shoulder. “We've got people who can take care of us. We could start over here, together. Can't you think about this for a minute?”

Joey slid the key in his pocket and adjusted the sling of Derek's shotgun, Bethany, over his shoulder. He leveled his gaze at Kate and said, “Think? Do you not know who you're talking to?”

“Stubborn fool,” Kate said as she smacked his chest lightly. “You'll  _die_  out there.”

“She's got a point,” the man who had shouted at them and threatened to turn them into Swiss cheese said as he approached Joey. He handed Joey his plastic bag, which weighed considerably more than it originally did, since it was full of food and shotgun shells. “Your concern for your friends is admirable, but it's not the best idea to go solo.”

Joey took the bag. “Thanks, but with all due respect, I don't plan on singing any songs by myself.”

The major looked puzzled for a minute, but recovered quickly. “I run into my two favorite actors and one of them up and leaves on me. Sorry we can't take you any further than this, but we got to head back to base camp. It's a real shame, is what it is. We could use a man with your strength and resolve.”

He slapped Joey on the back, and Joey had to suppress a groan of pain as he nearly stumbled over. He replied, “Uh, yeah, I'm just glad you recognized us. And Kate here, she's tough. You'll need someone like her on your side, wherever it is you're going.”

“Sir.” The man nodded, then, at the sound of a distant gunshot, scanned the darkness around them for any sign of movement. Joey searched too, but found nothing. He shook the major's hand and saluted him with more force than he should have.

“Good luck,” Major Tom said, and did an about-face back to the Humvee.

Joey and Kate looked at each other awkwardly, the sound of crickets filling the air.

“I should probably go too,” she said, then kissed Joey on the cheek. “Take care of yourself, Joey. I hope you get your happy ending.” 

“Right back atcha,” Joey said and watched her board the Humvee. They waved at each other, and Joey watched her as she disappeared into the night.  

As Joey pushed the door open to the darkened interior of the abandoned bookstore - next to the road that would take him back home - he paused, waiting for the sound of snarls and groans. He remembered what the major said about zombies not liking buildings, but it was still good to be cautious.

He moved up and down the aisles, shining a flashlight here and there. The lights didn’t work when he tried them, but the store was empty, cozy, and a great place to rest for a while. He knew he should be pushing forward, since the soldiers also filled him in on zombies hiding during the night - whatever these things were, they were  _weird_  - but the day's events had worn him out.

When he was confident in the safety of his surroundings, he walked up to the small coffee shop that was nestled in the back of the bookstore.

As he ran the beam of his flashlight along the counter, Joey couldn’t help being reminded of Central Perk.

It hit him, once again, how much he missed his friends - how much he missed  _Rachel_  - and hoped they were all right. As sentimental as he was feeling, he even missed Gunther, and hoped the poor bastard had survived.

Joey ate some of the rations the soldiers had given him and found a comfortable place to rest, next to the horror section.

At least, unlike the other two times he’d gone into a bookstore to nap, nobody told him to get up and leave.

 

 

 

While it was still dark outside, Chandler rolled the Porsche to a halt.

“What is it?” Monica asked, sounding like she already knew the problem.

Chandler sighed. He didn’t know how to break it to her, but he had to, sooner or later. “I... I don’t think she’s got anymore juice.”  
   
“Well, if it's a problem with the battery, maybe we could replace it with another one. You know how to do that, right?”

Chandler raised his eyebrows. “Sure, just let me get my tools from the shed.”

Monica bit her lip, which was quivering as tears slid down her cheeks. “Well,” she said. “This is just the icing on top of a cake of crap, isn't it?”

Regretting his joke, Chandler unbuckled his seatbelt to hug her, wiping her tears off of her cheeks with his free hand. She cried silently, clutching onto him, and they held each other for a moment, postponing the inevitable.

After Chandler pulled back from Monica a bit, she said, “It doesn’t have to be like this. We could push her all the way to Manhattan.”

“As fun as that sounds,” he said gently, “I think we should start looking for a new ride home.”

Monica didn’t answer him, and he knew he had to let her grieve for a moment. The Porsche was just as much of a baby to her as the twins were.

As Monica ran her fingers along the dashboard and said her goodbyes, Chandler got out and searched further up the street for abandoned cars. He came back to report that he’d found a station wagon with its driver’s door left open, and a set of keys still in the ignition. 

Monica laughed, but in a dry, humorless way.  “We've finally crossed over, haven't we? Now we’re just like all those other middle-class, suburban families.”

“At least we’re one of the living ones,” Chandler offered, along with his hand, and Monica grabbed onto it as she got out of the Porsche. She touched her fingers to her lips, then pressed them against the hood before she fell into step behind Chandler.

As they got the twins and their essentials settled into the station wagon, Chandler heard it again: that same low, steady sound which made him curious and uncomfortable at the same time.

“Yeah, that’s definitely music,” he said.

“It is," Monica agreed as she dried her eyes. "It kinda sounds like...”

“The Spice Girls,” both of them said at the same time.

“I can’t believe I’m even saying this, but...” Monica paused to furrow her brow. “Do you think  _they're_ the ones playing it?”

“If they are,” Chandler said as he got into the driver’s seat, “then they must be stopped.”


	5. 4

>   
>  **July 2006**
> 
> At the cocktail party for NYU's science department, Ross was a god amongst men.
> 
> Rachel admired him for a while as he moved through the crowd, then wondered when he’d come back and talk to her. She had planned on being a social butterfly herself, but as she tried listening in on conversations about fossils - and made a few jokes about them that fell less than flat - she parked herself at the bar. She stood there, swaying to the music and downing champagne until Ross finally returned to her.
> 
> “Well, hey!” he said brightly. “You seem to be enjoying this a lot more than I thought you would.”
> 
> “That’s probably because I. Am.   _Wasted_ ,” Rachel said, giggling, and Ross grabbed onto her when she almost toppled over in her heels. “Good thing I can cover it up, huh?”
> 
> As he held her upright, Ross said, “Okay, look, I’m gonna get you out of here. Sorry you weren’t having a good time.”
> 
> “Not having a good time?” she drawled. “You know how many people congratulated me on our engagement, then asked me when we're finally going to set the date? And the people who went on and on about all this dinosaur crap I couldn’t even pretend to follow? I think I lost track after those stuffy triplets in the blue blazers left.”
> 
> Ross turned around to look at whom she was pointing. “Rach, that’s a waiter. Singular.”
> 
> “See? This is the best damn party I’ve ever been to!” She lifted her champagne glass up to her mouth, but Ross pulled it down.
> 
> “How much have you had to drink?”
> 
> “Well, let’s see: two, three, five…” Rachel paused, squinting as she made a big show of counting with her hands. “Six,” she said, proudly wiggling all ten of her fingers.
> 
> “Oh,” Ross said. “That’s not as bad as I —”
> 
> “— Teen.”
> 
> “We’re leaving.” He took her by the arm and started to lead the long way around the room, but she resisted him, pulling out his grip and standing her ground. “Rachel, please! We don’t need to make this any harder than it already is.”
> 
> “That’s what she said!” she blurted out.
> 
> “ _Rachel_!”
> 
> “Oh, come on, you walked right into that one.”
> 
> Ross rolled his eyes. “Okay, so that’s one more show Emma won’t be watching.”

 

An hour after noon, Rachel drove down the street of a quiet suburban neighborhood, feeling like she was going around in circles. She looked up at the same sign she had already seen twice, cursed, and pulled over onto the side of the road, underneath some trees.

“Mommy?” Emma called out from the backseat. “Where are we?”

 “I... I don't know,” Rachel said, two seconds away from banging her forehead against the steering wheel.

“Are we going home soon? I wanna see Daddy.”

“I know, sweetie, I know,” Rachel said soothingly, “Mommy just needs a little brea - I mean, time to think.”

“Why?” Emma asked, sounding irritated.

Rachel glanced up at the rearview mirror and looked at her child. Emma wasn't just beautiful in the way most babies were. She had inherited Rachel's compassion and natural beauty - but not her natural nose, Rachel had been relieved to see. However, Emma also had Rachel's tendency to explode when she didn't get her way, and she was just about to reach her breaking point.

“I just need to figure out where we are,” Rachel said. “Hang on, we'll get home soon.”

“ _When_?” Emma cried out, and Rachel winced as her daughter decided to, in the middle of the apocalypse, throw one of her rare temper tantrums. “I wanna see Daddy! And Hugsy, too! I miss Hugsy, and I wanna go home and see him  _now_!”

 

>   
>  **August 2004**
> 
> As Rachel pushed Emma's stroller into Joey's apartment after the movers left, the reality of the situation hit her when she saw how bare the whole place was. No entertainment system, no Stevie the TV, no _Playboy_ magazines and cereal boxes anywhere. As far as Joey knew, no one would be moving into the place, and a part of Rachel secretly hoped it would remain that way. As thrilled and optimistic as she was for him taking the steps that would advance him in his career, she liked the idea of the place remaining vacant, in case he ever wanted to move back.
> 
> “Wow,” she said, stepping up to the counter and running her hand along it as she looked at the walls. “It’s not as bright as I remembered.”
> 
> He nodded, looking like he felt the same way. “Yeah. Look, Rach, the reason I asked you two to come over here was because... Well, I wanted to give Emma something.”
> 
> “But Joey, that’s not how it works. We were supposed to give you the going-away present.” It wasn’t until Rachel pointed that out that she felt a pang of regret at not having done so.
> 
> He waved off her protest. “Nah, dinner at Chandler and Monica's new place was enough. Anyway, I figured this would be a good a time as any to do this. Hang on a second.”
> 
> As Joey went into his bedroom, Rachel craned her neck as she leaned over the counter and listened to him rummage around. When he came back out with a poorly wrapped gift, Rachel's curiosity rose even more.
> 
> Emma hid her face in her hands in a sudden fit of shyness when Joey drew close to her with his present. He crouched down to her level and smiled widely.
> 
> “Emma,” he said, “this is for you.”
> 
> He held out the present, prompting her to take it.
> 
> “Go on, honey," Rachel said when Emma looked up at her. After hesitating for a second, she took the gift. In a flash, she was ripping off the wrapping paper, letting it fall to the floor in a heap.
> 
> When she uncovered a large stuffed penguin, Rachel gasped and said, “Oh my God.”
> 
> Emma looked at the toy in her hands, flitting her attention between it, Joey, and then up to her mother.
> 
> Rachel's voice shook as she spoke, her gaze leveled down to her friend's. “Joey...”
> 
> “Rach, it's okay,” he said, standing up again. “I want her to have him, honest.” He looked back at Emma. “You've always really loved that little guy. Only problem was, I loved him too, and I didn’t want you to have him.”
> 
> She only gazed up at him curiously, babbling a little.
> 
> “Well, I'll tell ya why,” Joey went on cheerfully, as if Emma had spoken to him, “your Uncle Joey was pretty selfish back then, but now I think it’d be better if you take him. His name’s Hugsy, in case you forgot.”
> 
> “See,” Emma tried to echo as she put her arms around the stuffed animal. 
> 
> “Oh, Joey, honey, you… you don’t know how much this means to us,” Rachel said. “Emma never really grew attached to the new one.”
> 
> “Doesn’t surprise me,” Joey said. “She could probably tell he was nowhere near as great as the original.”
> 
> Turning his attention back to Emma, he said, “You’ll take good care of him, right? He needs a new home, a nice one, and I think you can give it to him. Don’t go leaving him out of your tea parties and making him feel all sad and lonely, okay?”
> 
> Emma just tightened her grip around Hugsy.
> 
> “What do you say?” Rachel prompted her.
> 
> “See huggy,” Emma said, her words muffled by the penguin’s soft head.
> 
> “Don’t mention it,” Joey said to her, still smiling. Then, looking back at Rachel, he added in a lowered voice, “You should probably get him outta here, before I end up taking him back again.”
> 
> “Yeah, okay,” Rachel agreed, then, after picking up Hugsy, Rachel pushed Emma's stroller as she turned and waved goodbye to Joey, smiling gratefully at him as they left.
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> **November 2004**
> 
> “ _Joey, I got it_!” Rachel squealed over the phone, her voice so high and loud that, as Chandler would say, only dogs could hear her. She could almost see Joey holding his phone away from his ear, waiting for her incomprehensible shrieks to die down. “I got the job at Marc Jacobs. It’s like a dream come true!”
> 
> “Hey, all right! See, I told ya you were gonna get it,” he said, chuckling over the line.
> 
> “Yeah, but I was so nervous! I mean, with all the stuff that happened with Louis Vuitton and Ralph Lauren... Guess I finally caught a lucky break, huh?”
> 
> “Luck had nothing to do with it, all right? You're good at what you do, so you deserved to get something like this.”
> 
> “Aw, thanks, sweetie.”
> 
> “Plus, this is better for you, anyway. Won't have to put up with anyone who'll want to buy Emma, right?”
> 
> Rachel grinned.
> 
> “So, didja tell Ross about it? You two should go out and celebrate!”
> 
> Rachel's smile faltered, and she started pacing a little. “Uh, no, I didn't tell him. But I will when he gets home.”
> 
> “Great! He's gonna be so excited. Now you can get him a new pair of leather pants,” Joey said with a laugh.
> 
> Rachel laughed too, but weakly. “Yeah, he'll be thrilled.”
> 
> The truth was, Ross hadn't been... _discouraging_ Rachel against getting a job, exactly. But he hadn't been encouraging, either. When she had told him about her interview with Marc Jacobs, Ross said, “That's great, Rach!” but she knew he was thinking, at the back of his mind like he always did, about Scarsdale. 
> 
> “So,” Rachel said before she stopped pacing and forced herself to stop thinking about Ross, “What're your Thanksgiving plans? Got any dates lined up?
> 
> Joey paused, then said, “Oh, uh, I was planning to go out with this one girl, but lately she’s been kind of… Intense. You know? I mean, she’s really hot, but half the time I’m with her, I’m wondering if she’s gonna tie me to my bed and break my legs, only not in the good way.”
> 
> “Hmm, sounds a lot like what Tom Traper went through two weeks ago,” Rachel said, trying not to laugh.
> 
> “That was two weeks ago? I coulda sworn it aired on Monday.” 
> 
> “No, that was a rerun. You - I mean, _Tom_ \- had that underwater fight at the aquarium.” 
> 
> Joey groaned. “I still can't believe they talked me into using a fake swordfish.”
> 
> “Are you kidding? That was the best part!” _Aside from you -_ Tom _\- ripping his tux off underwater_ , Rachel carefully omitted. She also didn't mention she might have recorded the rerun and _maybe_ watched that particular scene several times.
> 
> “Anyway,” she said abruptly, “About your girl trouble... How about I send you both some of my traditional English trifle? That oughta get rid of her!”
> 
> “Ooh, hey, that's a great idea!” Joey said. “Could you put a couple extra layers of jam in it?” he added hopefully.
> 
> “You bet!” 
> 
> They talked for a while after that, all the way through Rachel feeding Emma then greeting Ross as he came in. She put Joey on the phone with both of them, and for a moment, it felt like he was back there with them.
> 
> Then he said he had to get ready for a date, and after she hung up, Rachel couldn’t help but feel a little… something. She couldn’t even find the right word for it. It wasn’t sorrow, exactly. Not giddiness, jealousy or regret. It wasn’t even the gut-wrenching, absolute despair she’d felt when she’d been confronted by situations like this in the past.
> 
> In the end, it was a little bit of all of the above.
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
> **July 2006**
> 
> Rachel and Monica’s play date started out like it normally did. They drank coffee, watched their kids watch TV and talked about how fast they were growing up. Rachel wondered, like always, if she was being a bad mother because she was working so much, and Monica, like always, assured her she wasn’t.
> 
> “Oh, stop it, Ms. ‘I know exactly what I’m doing with my kids up until they move out,’” Rachel said.
> 
> “Come on, I'm not _that_ bad.”
> 
> “Huh,” Rachel grabbed Monica's cell phone and pretended to start looking at her schedule. “Yep,” she joked, “I see you already have something down for 2015. What does it say? Oh yes, ‘Let Aunt Rachel take the kids shopping, with the Porsche and credit cards.’ Hmm, I guess I can do that, and much, much earlier, if I need to.”
> 
> “Sure,” Monica said, “Go ahead and pencil that into your schedule, under the day the world ends, year two thousand and _never_.”
> 
> They both grinned at each other, then were interrupted by Chandler coming into the kitchen. Rachel asked him what he’d been up to, and he said, “Oh, just, uh… cleaning,” with an evasive look in his eye.
> 
> Rachel leaned in toward Monica. “Is that another way of saying, ‘shark hunting?'”
> 
> “You two _promised_ not to bring that up again!” he said, jabbing his finger at them in accusation as they giggled. “And no, I wasn’t ‘ _shark hunting_ ,’” he added in a nasal, mocking tone. “I was actually doing something a little more mature than that.”
> 
> “Oh, right,” Monica said with a knowing smirk. “You were singing in front of the bathroom mirror again, weren’t you?”
> 
> “No, I was playing with the Xbox Joey left from his last visit.”
> 
> “What?” Rachel asked, lowering her coffee cup. “What do you mean, Joey’s _last_ visit? He hasn’t been here since he moved away.”
> 
> Chandler looked at Monica, then Rachel, then back at Monica.
> 
> “Do me a favor and put some masking tape over my mouth whenever Rachel’s around,” he said to his wife. “Better yet, maybe we should staple my lips shut.”
> 
> Monica leaned back in her chair, rubbing at her temple as she squeezed her eyes shut. “I think I’ll let Joey do that if he finds out you told her.”
> 
> Rachel set her cup down on the table. “Um, guys?” she asked, her voice shaking a little. “What’s going on? Why didn’t Joey tell me he was here? Do the others know about this?”
> 
> “Nope. We’re the only ones,” Monica said.
> 
> “Yep, only us. And Phoebe. Also Judy, but only because she was here at the time,” Chandler blurted out. “But Ross still doesn’t know, so you weren’t completely alone. Yay!” He raised his hands to do a little celebratory wave. 
> 
> “ _Judy_ knew about this, and we didn’t?” Rachel asked.
> 
> Monica whirled around in her seat. “Chandler!”
> 
> He opened his mouth to say something, closed it, then bolted out of the kitchen through the back door, letting it slam shut behind him.
> 
> “It’s okay!” Monica called out when the kids turned, in unison, toward the kitchen. They looked at her with curious expressions for a few seconds, then looked back at the television.
> 
> Rachel was still confused. “I… I just don’t get it. Why wouldn’t he tell me he was coming to visit? Unless if…” She broke off when she realized that she knew exactly why.
> 
> Monica studied her face with an apprehensive expression. “Look, it’s not really such a big deal if you think about it. He’s only been here once,” she admitted. “Okay, two times.”
> 
> Rachel raised her eyebrows.
> 
> “Fine, four,” Monica said with a huff. “Phoebe’s right, Chandler and I really _would_ suck at being spies.”
> 
> “So,” Rachel said, trying – and failing – to appear as nonchalant as possible. “Four times, huh?”
> 
> A pained look came over Monica’s face. “He really wanted to see you every time he came, and he didn't stay very long. But he figured you were busy with Ross, and he never said it, but I think he didn't want to... intrude.”
> 
> “But we talk on the phone all the time,” Rachel murmured. “God, you know, I just don’t get it.”
> 
> “This is Joey, after all. I don't think even _he_ gets it.”
> 
> She put her elbow on the table and began rubbing her forehead. “I thought he’s been over me since we broke up.”
> 
> “Well,” Monica said, “you also used to think the same thing about Ross.” She paused, then after biting her lip a little, she asked, “So, are you going to talk to Joey about it?”
> 
> Rachel sighed. “No. I think it would just hurt him even more if he knew I knew. And I just, I couldn't do that to him again. Plus, you know, he’s doing so well over there; I’m... over here with Ross, and we are really trying to make things work. _Really_ , really trying some days.” After a moment, Rachel realized that she'd been rambling. “Monica, why do all these guys keep falling in love with me, anyway?”
> 
> “Hell if I know,” she said with a shrug. “But, honey, be honest: do you _want_ to talk to Joey about all this?”
> 
> Rachel looked up and met her best friend’s clear blue eyes, knowing what she meant, and she took in a deep breath.
> 
> “I don’t know,” she said. “When we decided to end it, I thought it was for the best, but, just between us, sometimes I wonder what things would be like now if… Oh, you must hate me so much for even thinking this.”
> 
> Monica leaned closer to Rachel and covered her hand - the one with the engagement ring on it - with her own. “For what it’s worth, I don’t. I've been there, Phoebe's been there and by now we've all lost track of how many times _Ross_ has been there. But, if you want my advice, I think you should tell Joey you know, especially if you want to see him again.”
> 
> “Oh, I know, and I do wanna see him again, but…” Rachel shook her head. “It’s just that… No, I can't. I don't want to hurt him anymore.”
> 
> Monica pulled Rachel into a hug as she fought back tears. Emma went over to her immediately, clinging to her mother’s leg, and Rachel laughed, picking her up and setting her down on her lap.
> 
> “Don’t worry, sweetie. Mommy’s okay,” Rachel said, drying her eyes with a tissue that Monica had handed her. “Thanks. It really isn’t that a big deal, you know. I mean, it’s not like I’m in love with Joey, or anything.” When she laughed, it came out sounding dry and forced. “I mean, that ship already sailed away ages ago.”
> 
>  
> 
>  
> 
>   
>  **September 30, 2006**
> 
> Though she’d managed to hold herself together downstairs with her mother, Rachel couldn’t help but give into the tears after she entered the guest room, where Emma was sleeping. Rachel rummaged around in her purse, still sniffling, and went into the bathroom as she searched for a familiar number on her cell phone.
> 
> When the other line picked up on the third ring, she sighed in relief.
> 
> “Hi,” she said, her voice shaky and thick. “It’s me.”
> 
> Joey’s response was immediate, and full of concern. “What’s wrong?”
> 
> Leaning against the sink, she let out her answer like a dam that had finally collapsed under the assault of what had been wearing it down.
> 
> “ _Everything_.”
> 
> After a few seconds of shifting movement on Joey’s end, all Rachel heard was complete silence.
> 
> When she started to wonder if he was still there, he spoke up again. “I’m coming back.”
> 
> “Joey, you don’t have to —”
> 
> “— Yes,” he said, his voice a low, comforting tone. “Yes, I do. I’ll start driving over there first thing tomorrow morning.”
> 
> “Drive?” Rachel asked, puzzlement cutting through her grief. “You could fly first class.”
> 
> “Nah,” he said. “It’ll be fun to take another road trip, y'know. See if Martin’s still got that beard of bees. Don’t worry; I’ll be there before you know it.”
> 
> She closed her eyes, thankful that he’d insisted on returning. She missed him so much that it almost hurt to hear that promise, to know that he was finally on his way back home after two long years of being away – no, of being apart from her.
> 
> She whispered her farewell, telling him to call her when he arrived, and closed the cell phone.
> 
> _It's just a friend asking a friend for support_ , she told herself. _Nothing more than that._

 

“Oh,” Rachel said, as she started to realize the possibility what had once seemed so impossible.  “ _Oh_.”

“What?” Emma asked, too confused to yell anymore.

Which was exactly when a bunch of zombies decided to ambush the car.

 

 

 

Phoebe and Ross peered out the window, cringing at the group of about twenty zombies that were milling around the streets like they were on their way to work.

“Have you noticed that they only go out during the day?” Phoebe asked. “And they’re not so hot with the going inside buildings?”

“Yeah,” Ross said, still leaning all of his weight on the foot that was not attached to his injured ankle. The very idea that they had limitations was odd, but helpful.

Ross wondered, though, just how long the limitations would last.

Phoebe pointed to one of them: a woman in a power suit. “So, what do you think is her story?”

Ross stared at Phoebe with a look of disgust. “C’mon, Pheebs, I’m not gonna… zombie watch with you.”

“Okay, so you could spy on Ugly Naked Guy for years, but you can’t observe the undead.”

Ross sighed, looking down and pinpointing the wandering zombie Phoebe had been talking about.

“Well, she looks like she used to be a big CEO of a major company, until she turned into a zombie via cell phone signal and…” Ross winced when the staggering woman turned around and exposed her backside to him. “Crapped herself. Now she spends her days lurching around and eating human flesh. The end.”

Phoebe shook her head in disappointment. “Oh, Ross. If this is the kind of story you told your daughter…”

He snorted. “I guess I left my storytelling skills back in the real world.”

“No, you’ve just, you have to loosen up and use your imagination. Okay, see, she probably was a head honcho in business, but what we don’t know is that she was carrying on a secret affair… With a professional bull wrangler.”

“What?”

“Yeah, but it didn’t work out because, see, the bull wrangler wanted to run away to Mexico, but… Regina couldn’t do it; she had too much to lose. Right before the cell phone thing happened, Regina changed her mind, and called her lover to get ready to head for the border, but by then it was too late, and now they’re both doomed to wandering around the city forever, unable to find each other and remember who they once were.”

Ross couldn’t help but feel a little saddened by that. “Oh my God. That’s… that’s beautiful, Phoebe. Tragic, but beautiful.”

“I know. Now it’s your turn. And this time, don’t be skimpy with the details.”

“Okay,” Ross said, pointing out an older man who was sitting on the ground and tearing apart what looked to be a box of cereal. “He used to be a hotshot monkey trainer…who was also a secret undercover agent for NASA…”

“That's better, but let's try to be a bit more realistic, Ross.”

 

 

 

“Mailbox, Monica, _mailbox_!”

Monica fired off another shot into the crowd of zombies that was chasing the station wagon, then ducked back inside two seconds before a mailbox whizzed by the space her head had been.

“I’m starting to think that this was not such a good idea,” Chandler shouted as the station wagon roared down the street. “Check on the kids, will you?”

Monica looked over at them. 

“They’re fine,” she said, shifting back around to reload the rifle. “Actually, they seem to be enjoying this.”

Jack let out a gurgling laugh in confirmation. Erica shrieked happily and clapped her hands. “ _Yaaaaaaahoo_!” she shouted.

“Well, at least they’re having fun,” Chandler said, managing to avoid a Big Wheel that had been abandoned on its side.

“To tell you the truth, I kinda am, too.” Monica snapped the chamber shut and, taking a deep breath, heaved herself up into a cramped kneeling position in the seat to take aim out the window again.

“You’re loving this, aren’t you?” Chandler said with affection as he glanced over at her. Even with grime and sweat covering her face, she was still gorgeous. Killing these monsters seemed to have given her back her spark, which he’d thought she lost when they had to leave the Porsche behind.

 _She looks like an Amazon warrior_ , he thought. _Just without the leather. Mmm, leather...  
_

“I’m telling you, this is my second calling!” Monica cried out as she took another shot at the crowd of shambling monsters.

 

 

 

Rachel was squashed halfway in the back seat in her rush to get to Emma as the car was rocked back and forth. She was still struggling to find the pepper spray she’d dropped on the foot well in the back out of sheer panic. In the recess of her screaming mind, she knew the spray wouldn’t do anything against the hungry beasts around her, but the small device was the only defense she had.

Suddenly, she heard a series of sharp, short gunshots rattling through the air, and she lunged forward, pressing herself over her daughter.

When the car stopped moving and the noises faded away, she dared to look up, and when she did, she saw only one, living person standing several yards away from the car, breathing heavily.

She gasped when she realized just who had saved her and Emma's lives.

“ _Charlie_?”

The woman lowered her handgun, looking just as shaken and confused. “Rachel?”

After checking on Emma, Rachel clumsily threw open the door of the vehicle. She nearly toppled out of the backseat and onto a bloody corpse, but she twisted a little to the left at the last second and yelped as she hit the pavement.

 _Should’ve gone for the bod_ y, she thought as she lay on the ground, dazed. Normally, she would’ve been flushed with embarrassment and frustration, but considering that she just had her ass saved, she was willing to toss her humiliation to the side.

“Here,” Charlie said, walking over to her and offering her hand. Rachel took it and stood, wiping the grit and sweat out of her palms on her jeans.

“I can’t believe you just did that,” she said. It was strange. A few years ago, Rachel would’ve liked nothing more than punching Charlie in the face repeatedly, but in the moment, she had the overwhelming urge to kiss the woman out of relief and gratitude.

“Yeah,” Charlie said a little shakily. “Me neither. Especially since I just used up my last round of bullets.”

“Oh.” Rachel said. “Crap.”

“Damnit!” Emma added helpfully from the backseat.

“Emma?” Charlie asked, the shocked expression still on her face.

“Oh, right. Sorry,” Rachel said. “Emma, this is Charlie. Charlie, you remember Emma.”

“Nice to see you both again,” Charlie said with a quick nod to Emma, then added, "Though this could've happened under better circumstances..."  She jerked her head in the direction Rachel had come from. “Come on, let’s go. My place is just down the street.”

Rachel was about to ask her a dozen questions, but when she noticed that the zombies Charlie had shot were still twitching a little, she unbuckled Emma's seatbelt.

 

 

 

As the sun began to set and the crowd of zombies downstairs started to dissipate, Phoebe and Ross slumped onto the couch together, both of them exhausted.

“I think we could write a novel with all the stuff we just came up with,” Ross said. “That was… that was actually fun, Pheebs.”

“Yeah, well, the fun never ends here in Zombie City,” she said, then got up again, heading toward the door.

“Where are you going?” he asked.

“Out.”

“What? Are you crazy?”

She paused, turning to look back at him.

“Okay, poor choice of words,” he said. “But seriously, after all that stuff you said before about it being safe in here, after getting confirmation just _minutes_ ago that those things are still around, you’re gonna risk going out there?”

“Yeah, I am,” Phoebe said. “What’s your point?”

He put his arms down on either side of him to lift himself up from the couch. “I’m going with you.”

“Ross, you need to stay here and rest,” she said, her voice calm and even. “Plus, you’d just slow me down. I’m gonna look for Mike and see if I’m right about something.”

“Something?” Ross repeated. “Something like what?”

“That’s what I need to find out,” she said, leaving it at that. Then she went out the door, closing it behind her before Ross could yell at her to come back.

He leaned against the leather seat, looking up at the ceiling and hoping that Phoebe, then Rachel and Emma, would come back to him safe and sound.

 

 

 

In Charlie's house, Rachel couldn’t stop her skin from crawling at the thought of the oncoming zombies. On their way to the house, Charlie assured her that they were safe because none of the zombies she’d seen had ever gone into a home, even if they knew it was occupied. Apparently they liked to wait outside, since they had more room to move around and could catch stragglers that way. To Rachel, it seemed ridiculous – and a little unnerving – that the monsters were aware enough to have a preference, but after considering the alternative, she was glad to know that she, Charlie, and Emma would be safe, as long as they were indoors.

She chose not to think too much about the flipside of that rule: that all the survivors of the human race were being turned into prisoners inside their own homes.

After giving Emma a bottle of water and taking a breather in the kitchen, Rachel explained that she was on her way back to the West Village.

When she saw concern passing over Charlie’s face, she felt even more alarmed.

“What?” she asked, and Charlie got up from the table.

“I was wondering what you were doing way out here,” she said, leaving the kitchen. When she came back, Rachel saw that she was carrying a map of Long Island, and she spread it out on the table.

“See?” she said, pointing at the area of her residence. “We’re all the way at the end.”

Rachel could nothing but stare down at the map, inwardly wailing at her misplaced sense of direction.

While Charlie folded up the map, Rachel gave Emma a few of her books from the bag she had grabbed out of the car, then went back into the kitchen, where Charlie was sitting.

“You know,” Charlie said as she tipped her own water bottle toward her, looking down at it. “I never would have thought in a million years I’d ever see you again.”

“Yeah,” Rachel said as she sat down across from Charlie. “Me too. Did you transfer to another school?”

“I got a really good offer out here, so I decided, why not? Especially since it got kind of awkward being around Ross after Benji and I got back together.”

“Oh, that’s right,” Rachel said, remembering what Ross had told her and the others after announcing the break up. She noticed the ring on Charlie’s left hand, and added, “You two got married?”

Charlie smiled a little. “About a year ago, in September.”

“Congratulations,” Rachel said, and really meant it.

“Thanks," Charlie said. "You too. Is it Joey, or Ross?"

Rachel gave her a puzzled look, then followed Charlie's gaze, down to the ring on her own hand. “Oh, right. It's, um, Ross.”

Charlie didn’t look the least bit perturbed. “I always wondered if you two would get back together, eventually. I guess it was only a matter of time, right?

“Yeah,” Rachel said again, still staring at her hand and speaking as though she were far, far away. “I guess it was.”

Charlie tilted her head to the side, fixing Rachel with a concerned look. “Did something happen to him, Rachel?”

“What?” Rachel said, meeting Charlie’s eyes. “Oh, no. I hope not. I haven’t seen him since the night before...”

“The Pulse?”

She blinked. “The what?”

“That’s what I’ve been calling it,” Charlie said with a shrug. “It seemed fitting.”

“How come?”

“Well, there was the whole thing with the cell phones. I figured that maybe since —”

“— Wait,” Rachel said. “You’re saying the cell phones did all of this? How do you know?”

“I was running some errands when it happened, and saw about three teenagers, along with this other guy who wasn’t with them, all act sort of strange while they were talking on their phones. They looked annoyed at first, but then they just… _lost_ it, and it was total chaos after that.”

Rachel thought back to the cell phone she’d seen lying forgotten on the floor, how uneasy she’d felt while passing by the devices and how that was why she'd decided not to pick any of them up to try using them. Turned out that Phoebe had been right all along. 

“Benji went golfing that day,” Charlie continued, shaking Rachel out of her memory. “He left his cell phone at home, but I haven’t see him yet. I hope…” She drew in a deep, shuddering breath, resting the heels of her palms on the edge of the table. “I hope nothing’s happened to him. Or Ross and Joey.”

Rachel put out her hand, and placed it on top of Charlie’s.

“They’ll be fine,” she said. “They _are_ fine.” She exhaled, leaning back in her chair. “To tell you the truth, It’s me I’m more worried about. I have no idea how I’m going to make it home now.”

“You’ll manage,” Charlie assured her. “Whenever I hung out with you guys, at the back of my mind I always thought, ‘Man, that Rachel’s kind of a bitch, but she knows how to take care of herself.’”

“Thanks,” Rachel said, smiling at her. “I thought the same about you.”

“Really?” Charlie asked, looking pleasantly surprised. “That’s so nice!”

 

 

 

As the sun started to rise, when Ross was ready to try hobbling outside to track Phoebe down, she came in through his front door. He was angry with her at first, demanding to know why she’d taken so long and scared him half to death, but when she said, “I missed you too,” he let his frustration with her subside. She put a heavy bag on his table, saying she didn’t see any zombies – although she did run into a few people who were also scavenging – but she'd gone to the drugstore nearby and brought some things to treat Ross’s injuries.

“I know this isn't going to make much sense, but they're playing music now,” she said as she watched him put a brace on his ankle, then replace the bandage on his neck. “It's coming from the stadium.”

“I _knew_ I heard music," Ross said, relieved to get confirmation of that. “I thought I was losing it.”

“Well, they already have,” she said. “I mean, Ricky Martin? Really?”

They agreed to go out the next night, after Ross had healed some more, and got ready for bed. After looking at the tentative beams of sunlight through the cracks between his curtains, Ross reflected on how strange it was having to sleep during the day.

“I’m glad I was with you when the world ended,” Phoebe said to him, shaking him out of his thoughts.

Ross looked at her, a trace of a smile tugging at his lips. “You are?”

“Well, no,” she admitted after a moment. “I’d rather be with my husband. Or Joey. Or Rachel. But you’d have been my next choice after them. Ooh, no, definitely after Monica.”

Ross couldn't believe it – was he really laughing? Was he actually finding humor out of this whole situation because of Phoebe?

“Thanks,” he said, in a dry tone that made him feel a little more like himself. “You’d have been my fifth choice too, Pheebs.”

She rolled her eyes. “As _if_. I lived on the street, remember? You wouldn’t have lasted five minutes without me. I’m totally your second choice.”

“Second?” He coughed. “Uh, what about Emma?”

“Well, since she came from Rachel, they both count as one.”

“Good night - I mean, good day, Pheebs,” he said, lying back down on his couch.

 

 

 

Rachel woke up on Charlie's couch in the late afternoon, rubbing her eyes and looking over at Charlie and Emma, who were both still sleeping.  After taking a bottle of water from Charlie's ample supply in the kitchen, Rachel idly toyed with her engagement ring.

At night, before they had slept, Rachel told Charlie everything that was going on with Ross, everything she'd been so eager to shove to the side with her mother. They sat on the same couch, Emma using her mother's lap as a pillow as Rachel quietly talked and Charlie nodded and made polite sounds. Instead of telling Rachel what to do or trying to convince her that she and Ross still belonged together, Charlie listened, with much more patience than Rachel would have given her. 

After Rachel was done, smoothing Emma's hair from her face as she slept, Charlie asked, “Do you still love him?”

“Yeah,” Rachel had said. “But...” She trailed off as she looked down at her ring.

“That's a big 'but,'” Charlie said after Rachel hadn't said anything in a while, and when Rachel met her eyes, they both smiled a little.

“ _But_ ,” Rachel said, then tossed her head a little as she spoke, “the problem is, with Ross, I always end up not loving myself. Or us. I mean, when I started spending more time at work than at home, Ross's first thought was that I was having orgies with my co-workers. We argued in front of Emma about everything, all the time.” She let out a humorless laugh.  “No wonder we couldn't set the date!”

Charlie looked as if she didn't know what to say.

“There's something else,” Rachel said slowly, hesitantly, until Charlie met her eyes. “I called Joey the night before The Pulse. And it took me a while to figure it out, but I... I think I know why I called him.”

Charlie widened her eyes slightly, then shifted around on the couch. 

“Go ahead, you can say it,” Rachel said, awaiting Charlie's reaction as she wearily rubbed her eyelid. “Whatever it is, I deserve it.”

To her surprise, Charlie said, “Are you sure? I'm not exactly in the best position to judge you, Rachel.”

“Yeah, not so much,” Rachel had agreed, feeling relieved all the same. When she laughed again, she really did feel amused. “God, just look at me! End of the world, and I'm having guy problems. What is my deal, anyway?” 

“Nothing. It makes sense to fixate on what's normal when everything else in your life's been disrupted,” Charlie said.

Rachel nodded. “Okay, I'll go with that. And y'know, thanks to you, I know what I want to do. Emma and I are going to make it back home, and when we do, I'm going to fix things with Ross, for good.” She paused, then added, “As friends.”

“I thought that might be the right decision," Charlie said. "I just didn't know if it was right for me to tell you what you should probably do."

“It's okay,” Rachel had said as she looked down at her engagement ring. "I'm kinda glad you didn't. I think I had to work things out for myself." 

Hours later, after getting some sleep and feeling closer to human than she'd had in a long time, Rachel stopped fiddling with her ring as she peered out Charlie's kitchen window. She took another sip of water from the window, and could almost feel the confidence rising deep within her. Just as her heavy burden of the last couple years had been lifted off her chest through her talk with Charlie, looking out her window gave Rachel hope that she could make it back home.

That she _would_  make it back. 

She heard someone stirring in the living room. Soon, Charlie walked into the kitchen as she yawned, greeting Rachel while she got some water. They had the last of her bread and peanut butter for breakfast - what would have originally been an early dinner - and agreed that they had to go into town, so Charlie could search for Benji and bullets, and so Rachel could get back to Manhattan.

They went outside an hour later, just as the sun was starting to set. Rachel held Emma's hand as Charlie led the way to Sandra's car.

As they neared it, Rachel gripped onto Charlie's arm, pulling them to a halt in the middle of the street.

“They're gone,” she whispered, looking at the area around the BMW in horror. Except for the bloodstains on the car and pavement, there was no sign that any zombies had been around.

“It's worse than that,” Charlie said, her mouth set in a thin line as she knelt down and examined the crimson marks that were leading all the way up toward the main road. “I think they're evolving."

“What?” Rachel said, lowering Emma to the ground.

Charlie looked at her, then stood up. “Not so they'll be completely human again. Actually, I think they're becoming more like —”

Before Rachel could comprehend what was happening, a formerly handsome-looking zombie wearing a polo vest and cleats came flying out from behind some trees next to the street, and he bit down on Charlie's arm.

_Bosco...dictiasaur!_

The thought suddenly popped into Rachel's head as she stepped in front of Emma.

_Silent M!_

She didn't know why she was suddenly having those strange thoughts, but she didn't care.

“Excuse me,” Rachel snapped at him as Charlie tried to push him off of her with her free hand. “We are _trying_ to have a conversation here!”

Then, without pausing to think, Rachel unlocked the car, wrenched the door open, felt around the foot well of the backseat, grabbed her pepper spray, and swung it around, squirting it straight into the zombie’s eyes.

He groaned in protest, leaving deep bite marks on Charlie's arm as she crumpled to the pavement, but he got right back up again, flailing around. Rachel screamed, swiftly put Emma into her car seat, and closed the door just as the zombie in cleats blindly ran at her, swiping at the air.

_Baby It's You!_

“Not if I can help it,” Rachel growled, then promptly kicked him right between his legs. He went down _hard_ , and didn't look like he was going to get up anytime soon.

“Huh, good thing that's still effective,” Rachel said, but she wasn't about to celebrate with Charlie writhing on the ground next to her attacker, and with what she heard were more sounds of oncoming zombies approaching.

Less than a minute later, she was tearing down the street in the BMW. She tossed Charlie one of her favorite sweaters to put around her arm and turned on her headlights as the sun finished setting.

“Are you gonna be okay?” Rachel asked, trying not to glance too much at the stain that was spreading through the sweater's fabric.

Charlie took a deep, shuddering breath before answering, a tear rolling down her cheek. “I don't know. I don't know if I even care anymore.”

“Why?”

“Because you just pepper sprayed my husband.”

“ _Noooooo_ ,” Rachel groaned.

“I'm afraid so.”

“Oh, I'm so sorry, Charlie.”

“It's just as well that he got me before you took care of him,” Charlie added sadly, lifting the sweater from her arm.

“What does that mean?”

“Rachel, we’ve both seen zombie movies.”

“I haven’t! I couldn't even make it twenty minutes into one of them.”

“But you do know how this is going to go down, right?” Charlie asked, her voice sounding very thin and strained.

“Well, you… You never know!” Rachel said, although the panic was starting to rise in her again as she recalled the horrors of what she’d seen before making Joey stop the tape and put it in the freezer. “This could be different.”

As they headed downtown, Charlie said, “Hey, I’m black and attractive. I’m surprised I lasted this long.”

“You’re not gonna die,” Rachel said firmly. “I didn’t finally get to bond with a woman other than Monica and Phoebe for nothing.”

 

 

 

“ _Now_ can we go?” Ross asked, trying to keep the whining undertone out of his voice, temporarily forgetting the chess game he and Phoebe had been playing.

“It's not nighttime yet. But if you want to go out now and get ripped to shreds, be my guest,” Phoebe said, moving a chess piece at random on the board.

Ross frowned. “You don’t even know how to play, do you?”

“I thought you knew that.” Phoebe pushed back in her chair and rubbed her eyes.

“Don’t worry about Mike, okay?” Ross said, his expression softening. “I’m sure he’s fine.”

“If he is, he would’ve come here by now,” Phoebe said, exhaustion and irritation thick in her voice. “I looked  _everywhere_  for him last night. I stopped by the record store, the grocery store, our favorite sex shop…” She swallowed thickly. “I think he might be — “

“— He’s not,” Ross said, putting more confidence behind his words than he truly felt. “You’re going to find him, and when this is all over, you’ll get to live out your fairy tale dream with him. Right? Kids, a house near Monica and Chandler, and your Volvo.”

Phoebe lowered her hand. “That was the plan. It was a pretty good one, too.”

“Yeah, whatever happened with that?” Ross had never known because Phoebe never talked about it.

“I don’t know. I guess it was just… He was getting a lot of gigs, and I was doing pretty well at that soulsucking corporate massage place.”

“You were doing a lot better there than having random strangers come into your friends’ apartments,” Ross offered.

“Yeah, and it was, you know, comfortable. So comfortable that we just never decided to leave.”

“I, uh, know the feeling,” Ross said, leaving out the part about Rachel being the one who kept refusing to move to the suburbs.

“And we tried having kids," she said.  "We really did. I don’t know, maybe I used up all my good karma with the triplets. I love them and am so, so glad I could have them for Frank and Alice, but...” Phoebe paused as she began to worry at her lower lip. “What if this is it for me? Even if I do find Mike, what if we were just never cut out to have kids of our own, like Monica and Chandler?”

“Hey. Look at me. He _will_ come here, okay? Or, who knows, we’ll probably find him tonight.” Catching the beginnings of a hopeful smile on Phoebe’s face, Ross added, “And if he is dead, it’s all good, ‘cause I’m still your backup, right?”

“I thought we decided that Joey's my backup,” she said, her smile growing.

“Yeah, well, he’s not the one sitting here with you while the world is falling apart.”

Phoebe's grin disappeared. “You really would repopulate the planet with me?”

“Hey, I don’t know what it is, but making babies seems to be one of my strong suits. I don’t know how, but one way or another, I can _make it happen_."

"So, why haven't you and Rachel had another kid yet?" Phoebe asked. "I mean, I thought by now you'd have at least another accident - I mean, a brother or sister for Emma by now."

Ross didn't know how to answer at first. The truth was, he did want to have another child with Rachel, but she had been so busy all the time, and didn't seem very interested in going through another pregnancy. In fact, every time Ross had brought up the idea with her, she'd always raised her eyebrows with a look on her face that said, 'Are you kidding me?' 

He drew in a long breath. "I guess a big family wasn't in the cards for us, either."

"Well, like you said, if worst comes to worst, we could try cutting out the middlemen and have a kid of our own." 

Something weird happened, then. Phoebe just kept _looking_ at Ross with a different sort of expression on her face, like she was actually considering his offer. Even if it was just a joke.

Totally a joke.

“Uh, Pheebs?” he asked.

“Your move, Geller,” she said. “Your move.”

All he could do was stare right back at her, wondering if this is the part where he was supposed to —

“Seriously, it's your move,” Phoebe said, pointing down at the chess board.

Ross shook his head. “Oh, sorry, I thought we stopped playing.”

“If you call that ‘playing,’” she said with a snort, eyeing his perfectly organized pieces.

 

 

 

As Rachel stopped the car in front of a hospital, Charlie tried to get out of the car herself, but Rachel held her back, telling her to save her energy. At first Rachel wondered whether she should leave Charlie and Emma so she could go inside the building, but she didn't have to, since the front door opened and three people from inside ran out to the car. One was a tall, hulking guy, another looked like a teenager, and the third was wearing a nurses's uniform, which sent a warm flood of relief through Rachel.

“You don’t think she’s gonna turn into one of... one of _them_ , do you?” Rachel asked the nurse after she opened the door to look in on Charlie.

“I don’t think she will,” the teenager said gravely. “I _know_ she will. So will you, and your little girl, too.”

Rachel turned to look at the girl in horror.

“No,” she whispered.

“Just kidding!” the teenager said with a laugh. “I was bitten by one of them about four days ago. If this was contagious, it would have taken effect by now. Oh man, you should see the look on your face!”

Rachel stared at the girl. “What’s wrong with you?”

“Oh, right,” she scoffed as the burly man lifted Charlie out of the car and carried her up up the steps. “Bunch of freaking cannibals running around these days, and you’re acting like _I've_ got issues.”

Later, Rachel made sure that Charlie was all right when she was settled into one of the hospital beds. The nurse cleaned Charlie's wound and set up an IV for her that was connected to a bag of blood. For a while, Rachel dozed with Emma sitting on her lap in the seat adjacent to the bed, until Charlie opened her eyes and made a few murmuring sounds. At her stirring, Rachel stood up and gently settled Emma back in the chair, then stepped up to the bed.

Charlie peered at Rachel with unfocused eyes, and said, "Benji?"

“No,” Rachel said.  “Sorry to disappoint you.”

“Oh. I thought...” Charlie shook her head. “Where am I?”

Rachel explained where she'd been taken, then said, “I found out some other stuff about our new friends. You won't be turning into one of them, they don’t come out at night, and apparently, they like pop.”

“Soda?”

“Music.”

Charlie frowned, then shook her head in disbelief. “I’m sorry, what?”

“Yeah. Somebody said they camp out in huge, open areas like sports fields and blast pop music.”

“So, they’re… groupies?”

“Actually, they’re more like cheerleaders,” Rachel said. “I should know, I was one of ‘em for four years. They’re probably going through the same things I did, except, you know, less pyramids and bad sex. Maybe if they all start hooking up with each other, we won’t have to worry about them anymore. Well," she added, "not until we have to start paying for college.”

Charlie laughed a little until she clutched onto her arm, wincing.

“Okay, that’s enough out of me." Rachel pulled the covers up further over Charlie, like she did for Emma when she tucked her into bed. "Get some rest.”

“Thanks," Charlie said. "You’re not staying, are you?”

“Sorry. I would, but I have to…” Rachel jerked her head toward the door.

“Get back home. Yeah.”

“Get well soon, Charlie," Rachel said. "I'm sorry about your husband. And that I kicked him in the crotch.”

Putting on a brave face, Charlie said, “It's just as well. Since Ross will be single again, I guess I know where to go when I'm all healed up.”

Rachel smiled. “Right.”

Before she went out the door, she turned around and looked at Charlie with a small smile.

“Call me?” 

“Well," Charlie replied, looking completely serious, "as soon as civilization starts rebuilding itself and manages to recreate the phone networking system, which could take _decades_ , for all we know...”

Rachel raised her eyebrows a little.

“... And I just got that you were being sarcastic.”

“Bye, Charlie," Rachel said.

“Be safe.”

After Rachel thanked the nurse and walked outside into the night with Emma’s hand in hers, Emma asked, “Can we _please_  find Daddy now?” 

“Yeah. We'll find him and your aunts, and Uncle Chandler. And someone else.”

“Who?”

Rachel smiled as they started walking down the steps, anticipation and desire making her heart beat a little faster.

“You’ll see.”

 

 

 

Another shot ripped through a zombie, and it smacked down onto the pavement.

Joey had no time to celebrate, as nine more zombies were still on their feet and moving toward him in the middle of the suburban street, as the sun finished rising. 

He sprinted down the street, but, as he’d said himself once, Tribbianis weren’t known for being fast runners.

In retrospect, his idea to travel during the daytime didn’t seem so great anymore.  

Actually, it was pretty stupid. 

His thoughts were jumbled up, flipping between memories of better days with his friends, snippets of what happened to him since the highway, and his current situation. Up to this point, he’d thought himself to be such a badass, so much more awesome at surviving than he’d given himself credit for.

In the moment, though, as his lungs burned for air, he knew where he’d rather be.

Right when he thought he was going to outpace them, he fell down near a parked car, gasping and letting Bethany slip out of his left hand, he remembered something he’d said to Rachel several years ago:

_I’m a Tribbiani, Tribbianis_ quit _._

Yeah. This wasn’t so bad.

A part of him was yelling at himself to get back up, telling him that the others were all waiting for him to get back home and to stop being so damn lazy.

Despite that, he'd already begun to accept what was happening. What was about to happen. He thought he would make it to New York by now, but in the end, he should have known things would have turned out like this.

Joey Tribbiani had finally run out of luck.

He shut his eyes, waiting for the end. Time almost grinded down to a crawl then, so much so that the next few seconds magically – mercifully – dragged out into hours.

Within those seconds, Joey recounted all of the best moments in his life. He thought of his parents, grandparents, and all seven of his beautiful, loud, loving, vivacious sisters. He thought about Hugsy – Original, not Crappy, of course – and his friends’ kids, whom he hoped would all survive to grow up in a future without pain or suffering. Or, at the very least, in a world in which all the zombies were finally wiped out.

Joey let his thoughts linger on his friends.

He remembered all the times he helped Monica cook - well, taste-testing her food as _she_ cooked was more like it. How she spoon-fed him sometimes as she held his chin still. How he’d hugged her with one arm after she decided not to go through with the whole sperm donor thing, and how he'd known that someday, she would be one of the greatest moms in the world.  

He remembered going to Knicks games with Ross, the times they hung out in Central Perk just talking about random things, the awesome naps they had together, and how they managed to be best friends despite their differences, and the fact that they loved the same woman.

Then, there came the memories of Phoebe: how she just _got_ Joey all the time, and how she always tried to teach him new things, like playing the guitar, speaking French, and lying. He’d always been such a terrible student. Nevertheless, Pheebs went right on loving him and always being there for him, regardless of Joey’s inability to grasp even the simplest concepts.

He remembered the good times he shared with Chandler, whom had been his lifeline for more than a decade. Joey recalled their countless foosball games, the times they just hung out in their matching Barcaloungers and watched TV, how they both took care of the chick and the duck, and how supportive Chandler was of Joey’s career, never failing to lend him money that they both knew Chandler wouldn’t ever see again. Joey remembered, with a smile, how they pushed past all the misunderstandings and fights they had, and remained best friends for years.

Lastly, Joey thought about Rachel.

_Rachel…_

He looked up at the sky, as bright and blue as her eyes, and the swarming flock of zombies slowly began to surround him.


	6. 5

> **October 2005**
> 
> Monica and Chandler's first Halloween party at the new house turned out to be fairly successful.
> 
> According to Chandler, though, success – as usual – came at a price.
> 
> “Man,” Phoebe said after he greeted her and Mike in the foyer, “you must be the saddest-looking lion I’ve ever seen. And I was just at the zoo last week.”
> 
> Chandler shrugged. “It’s better than a pink bunny costume.”
> 
> “But not as good as a pink fairy costume,” Phoebe said, right before twirling around to show off her dress and waving her wand.
> 
> “Hey, man,” Chandler said, nodding at Mike's long-sleeved black shirt and jeans. “I may be speaking too soon here, but you’ll be a shoo-in for first place in our costume contest.”
> 
> “I wasn’t about to dress up,” Mike admitted, “but Phoebe talked me into it.”
> 
> “Really? Who’re you supposed to be?”
> 
> “Ray Charles.”
> 
> Chandler squinted. “Again, _really_?”
> 
> “Oh, I almost forgot.” Mike took out a pair of sunglasses and put them on. “There.”
> 
> As he raised his eyebrows, Chandler said, “Wow, now the resemblance really is uncanny!”
> 
> After Phoebe and Mike left to go get some punch, Ross and Rachel came in, Ross carrying Emma on his shoulder.
> 
> After greeting Emma, who shyly buried her face into her father's shoulder, Chandler appraised Ross’s boxy, metal getup and said, “Looking good, Prime Optimus.”
> 
> Ross rolled his eyes. “It’s Optimus Prime. And I’m not him – I’m the Tin Man!” With his free hand, he raised his fake axe with enthusiasm.
> 
> Chandler stared at him. “You just get cooler and cooler every year, don’t you?”
> 
> “Said the guy who keeps dressing up in cute little animal costumes his wife picked out for him,” Ross scoffed.
> 
> “‘Cute?’ I’m ferocious. If pink bunny me were here right now, I’d devour myself.”
> 
> “Hey, speaking of which, what's up with all the zombies tonight?” Rachel asked. “We saw, like, five of them running around outside.”
> 
> “Oh, that fad’s still going strong since the  _Dawn of the Dead_ remake came out,” Chandler said. “There’s about three of them in the kitchen.”
> 
> “Huh.”
> 
> “Yeah, I don’t get it either. _So_ 1970s.”
> 
> “Where’s Mon?” Ross asked.
> 
> “Putting the cubs to bed. After that, she’s gonna go hunt some wildebeest.”
> 
> “She dressed up as a lioness?” Rachel said with a grin. “Oh, this I gotta see.”
> 
> “Yeah, it was part of our deal. I said that if I had to go lion, we’d _all_ have to go lion. Lion down.”
> 
> Ross watched him snicker at his own joke, then asked, “What happened to you?” He passed Emma off onto Rachel, told her he was going to get them drinks, and clanked away.
> 
> Chandler looked down at Rachel’s Dorothy hairstyle and checkered blue dress, then at Emma, who was dressed in a furry black jumpsuit and tugging at her dog ear headband. “Looks like we weren’t the only ones who decided to go the corny, but sentimental, family themed route.”
> 
> “Well, see, Ross really wanted us all to match, and I figured that this way, I get to wear a cute new dress and shiny red shoes,” Rachel said as she displayed her sparkly heels. “Emma's not too thrilled about being Toto, though. Oh, no, honey. Don’t tear the ears off.” She hitched Emma up on her hip and and re-positioned the dog ears with her free hand.
> 
> When Phoebe came back with Mike and hugged both Rachel and Emma, she said, “Oh, yay! This is so exciting. Look, we could be almost the entire cast of _The Wizard of Oz_!”
> 
> “Or the rulers of Loserville,” Chandler muttered.
> 
> Ross came back and handed Rachel a cup before taking Emma back. “What’s, uh, what’s going on?”
> 
> “Phoebe just said we could star in our own version of _The Wizard of Oz_.”
> 
> “Really?” Ross said, his eyes lighting up already. “Can we do it tonight? I’ll go get my video camera from the —”
> 
> “— _No_ ,” Rachel and Chandler said in very vehement unison. Ross let his axe droop in disappointment.
> 
> “It wouldn’t work, anyway,” Phoebe pointed out. “We’re missing the scarecrow, right?”
> 
> “Too bad Joey’s not here for this,” Rachel said, handing her cup to Emma so she could take a sip. “He’d make a good scarecrow.”
> 
> They all stood around a little awkwardly, until Chandler broke the silence by saying, “If he only had a brain, he would’ve flown back just for this party.”
> 
> The others looked at him and he added, “What? Did you all really think I was gonna let that one slide by?”
> 
> Someone knocked at the front door, and Chandler went to open it.
> 
> When he did, he saw a scarecrow that was eerily silent and that been lit on fire.
> 
> “Sorry,” Chandler said, “We ordered zombies. You must've gotten the wrong house.”
> 
> The scarecrow nodded, and walked away.
> 
> Chandler closed the door, shaking his head. 
> 
> “Well, I don't remember  _that_  happening at our party,” Chandler said, and when he turned to face the others, he

  
woke up.

Chandler sat up like a shot, his heart racing and his palms sweaty. He took a second to remember where he was: some stranger's house, in bed with Monica, the twins thankfully slumbering even though they had to be crammed into one crib. Sunlight streamed through the window, and Chandler could hear the faint groaning of zombies outside.

“And I won't be sleeping for a  _week_ ,” he said.

Next to him, Monica started mumbling and shifting around, clearly having her own nightmare.

“Monica, wake up,” he said, gently shaking her while trying not to wake the kids. “Monica!”

 

 

 

“Monica!” Rachel said, waving and walking toward Monica on the empty street in front of Central Perk.

When they stopped in front of each other, Rachel didn't smile, but she still looked like she thought something was funny.

“I miss you,” Monica said. It was the only thing she could think of to say, in the moment. “We used to hang out every day, remember?”

“I know,” Rachel said. “I miss you too.”

When she blinked, she did it very slowly, almost lazily. It took her about a whole minute.

Then she said, “I’m dead, Mon.”

“What?” Monica cried. “No. No, you’re not. I just saw you two months ago. You _can’t_ be dead.”

“Then how come I am?” Rachel asked in a tired voice. She turned her head around, craning her neck as if she were listening for something, or rather, waiting for someone to join them, before appearing to give up, and looked back at Monica.

“Well, there you have it. Looks like you get Emma after all,” she murmured, the faint smile in her eyes finally reaching her mouth.

“Rachel…” Monica said as her gut twisted in panic. “You know I love Emma with all my heart, but I can’t – she's yours, you need to be here so you'll teach her all your bad habits! Okay? And I have Erica and Jack; I can't handle three kids at once!”

“Sure, you can.” Taking a step forward, Rachel put her hand on Monica’s shoulder and looked her directly in the eyes. “You can do anything, remember?”

It wasn’t until then that Monica noticed it: about half of Rachel’s face was missing.

She jerked awake in a cold sweat, Chandler shaking her shoulder.

“Oh, good,” he said, relieved. “You were starting to scare me, and with everything that's been going on, that's saying a lot. Bad dream?”

Monica took in a deep, shuddering breath as she gripped onto Chandler's arm. “The worst. I hope it doesn’t turn out to be like Phoebe’s.”

“Wait.” Chandler furrowed his brow as he rubbed Monica's arm comfortingly. “You think... maybe _they_ had something to do with both of us having nightmares?”

Monica sighed as she flopped back down on her pillow, looking up at the ceiling. “This is making less and less sense.” 

“I know,” Chandler said before kissing her forehead, and she smiled as his warm presence slowed her hammering heartbeat.  “I just hope the others aren't letting all of this get to them. Especially Joey.”

“And Rachel,” Monica murmured, as she thought back to her best friend's half of a face.  

 

 

 

Rachel saw more decay and destruction, things that she couldn't even truly comprehend, as she slowly made her way to Manhattan.

Then, miracle of miracles, she saw Joey.

He was with several other people, and he sauntered down the same street of the house in which Rachel had temporarily set up camp. She switched her attention over at her daughter, curled up on top of what used to be another couple’s bed, then looked back down.

She could see him from her vantage point on the second floor, the lights from the streetlamps shining down on him, and she thought that it would be nice, so very nice, if she could call out to him and have him turn around. If she could see him break out into a wide smile, stop in his tracks and then run up to the house, to her, and wrap her up in one of his warm, comforting hugs. It had been far too long since she’d received one of those.

“Joey,” she said, but it came out in a whisper. She tried again after swallowing, her dry throat clicking quietly. “Joey, I’m here. Please look up.”

Then, almost as if he had heard her, Joey stepped forward a little so she could get a better look at his whole face, even though he wasn't looking directly up at her. The lights from the moon and lamps hit his face, and…

It wasn't him.

Her eyes drifted downward, and she wondered why she even assumed the man was Joey in the first place. He was a lot leaner than Joey - and a lot _meaner_ than Joey - and was decked out in torn, faded green army fatigues.

Plus, he was holding a very large gun.

If this were any other situation, if this were only a movie, Rachel might have blushed at the sight of the man. But as she looked upon him and gave into the devastation and disappointment that had been building up inside her, all she felt toward the man was fear and resentment.

No, this wasn't her friend returning home. Besides, he couldn't have made it all the way across the country so fast.

She stepped away from the window, turning from the imposter, and tried to push her grief aside as she went back to bed.

 

 

 

 

 

> **April 2006**
> 
> Mike came up behind Phoebe as she was making pancakes, distracting her by kissing her neck first, then her shoulders.
> 
> “I love you, Phoebe Buffay,” he murmured. “More and more, every day.”
> 
> “Oh, that is such a _line_!” she said, turning around and grinning widely. “You really think that’s gonna get you lucky, mister?”
> 
> He wiggled his eyebrows a little. “Well, I think it’s gonna get me some awesome Chef Buffay pancakes, at the very least.”
> 
> “Okay, well, don’t tell Monica that I’m thinking about getting this recipe patented.”
> 
> She began to kiss him then, drawing it out nice and slow, and fighting the urge to grin when he started slipping his tongue into the mix. While he was preoccupied, she reached out behind herself and grabbed the ladle that was sitting in the bowl of batter, and, when the time was right, she flung some at him as she broke away from the kiss. He took a couple of steps back as he laughed, wiping the thick, gooey trail that had landed on his arm and chucking it back at her.
> 
> “You are in _so_ much trouble,” she said.
> 
> She grabbed the bowl and he bolted in the other direction, sprinting out of the kitchen and back to the bedroom as she followed him, hot on his heels.
> 
> It was a pain in the ass to clean up all the mess later, but it was so, so worth it.

 

“Mike’s dead,” Phoebe said in a conversational tone. As if she were telling Ross that she wanted the soup, not the salad.

“You don’t know that.”

“Actually, I do,” she said, feeling much too calm. “He’s just not here anymore. I can feel it. Or, I can’t feel it… _Him_. I can’t sense him anymore. I can feel him missing from this place.”

Ross didn’t say anything.

“He uses his cell phone more than the six of us did, combined.” She paused, then, her voice coming out much more husky and hollow, she started to add, “Well, Mike _used_ to use his…”

She buried her face in her hands before she could make it to the end. She sensed Ross tensing up where he sat, but after a while, when she'd already given him up for being an insensitive jerk, he pulled her close to him, and held her until she stopped crying.

 

 

 

“Monica, you have got to stop this.”

“What?” she asked as she was putting bandages on her hands, which had swollen up because of all the hours she'd clocked with her rifle. 

“This is the fifth house you’ve cleaned since we got off the highway. Enough is enough! What are you trying to do, scrub the whole block? Because I don't think we'll be driving away any zombies with the _power_ of _Mr._ _Clean_!”

Monica finished taping the last bandage in place. “Well, these houses are really dirty! I’m just trying to fix what I can before we move on.”

“I’m not worried about how some other people maintained or failed to maintain their living conditions, I’m worried about _you_. Dusting every surface you can, stopping to shoot as many zombies as possible...”

Monica gasped. “Are you saying I’m not a good leader?”

Chandler opened his mouth, then shut it, looking at the kids. They’d struck gold with this house and found two high chairs to feed the twins; before that, they’d had to feed them on counter tops. The twins were busy painting their trays with pudding and cracker crumbs, so Chandler jerked his head to the living room, and Monica followed him.

“It’s not that I don’t trust your judgment,” Chandler said when he felt the kids were out of earshot. “But we’re almost there, Mon. Are you… Are you scared of what we’ll find? Because it looks like things have held up okay to me.”

“No, I’m not scared," Monica said, putting her arms around herself in a comforting gesture. “I just need to… to do something. And you need to just stay out of my way while I do it.” She turned back around to go to the kids.

“Okay, _Ross_ ,” he said, and Monica whirled right around to face him.

“What did you say?”

“I said 'you're the boss.'"

"Chandler."

After glancing over to the kids, Chandler lowered his voice. “Ever since this whole thing started, you’ve been trying to take control of everything. Okay, you need to let me make the decisions for us once in a while, or you’re going to crack under all the pressure. And I’m just going to crack, period.”

Monica took a step back from him.

“I think we need to get out there while it’s still dark, get across the bridge, and find the others.  This is the perfect time to do that, and you know it.”

She brushed her hair out of her face, looking around the dusty house. Then she turned her gaze back to Chandler and said, “Okay.”

“Oh, for the love of…” He froze, his arms halfway thrown up in mid-air in exasperation. “What?”

“I said, ‘Okay,’” she said with a small smile, stepping closer to him. “Don’t make me say it again.”

“You… You agree with me?”

“Yeah. I think you’re right. I do like to wear the pants in this family, and I appreciate how okay with that you are, but I’ll… try to take them off once in a while. And I’ll admit it: I am so, _so_ scared of what we might find in the city, and I’ve been trying to stall us so we don’t have to go in there unless we have to. But we do, and we will. Tonight.”

“All right. Thank you,” Chandler said, letting out a sigh of relief. “By the way, the pants metaphor? _Total_ turn on.”

She smiled. “I knew I married you for a reason.”

“So it really isn’t because of my sizzling good looks or bulging biceps?” Chandler asked with a grin, and Monica wrapped her bandaged hand around the back of his head, pulling him in for one of the most intense, heartfelt kisses they’ve ever had.

 

 

 

“Where’s Daddy?” Emma asked after she and Rachel entered another house. “I wanna see Daddy.”

“I told you, honey, we’re going back home. Okay? Won’t be much longer now. Then you’ll see him.”

“But I’m _tired_!” Emma said for the fiftieth time.

“I know, I know. That’s why we came in here.” Rachel said, smoothing down the top of Emma’s head. She knew it would be better to be outside now, but she figured they could rest for a couple of hours. “Let’s take a nap.”

After rapping “Baby Got Back” to put Emma to sleep and tucking her into bed, Rachel looked down at her hand.

Her engagement ring was missing.

A rush of panic took over, breathing new life into her, and she scanned the carpet, searching everywhere, but she couldn't find the ring.

When she was back upstairs, having scoured the whole house twice, she slowly lowered herself down on the bed next to Emma, pulled her knees up to her chin, and stared straight ahead, digging her fingernail in the spaces between her teeth like she always did when she was nervous. She didn't sob, or even tear up, because she had no more tears to cry out. She ran out of them already, having used them all up since this mess started.

 _It’s a sign_ , she thought dully.   _This must mean that Ross is dead. And if he’s dead, Joey is, too. So's Mon, and the others. All my friends are dead._

 _No, they’re not_ , she argued. _Don’t you dare start thinking that way. They’re not dead._

“But what if they are?”

It took her a couple of seconds to realize she'd said that last thought out loud.

 

 

 

When Phoebe was ready and Ross found he could walk with a little more ease, they left the apartment, taking a motorcycle Phoebe had found earlier to the baseball stadium. Ross held onto Phoebe for dear life the whole way there.

“How come you know how to ride a motorcycle, but not a bike with just two wheels?” he yelled as the cold night air whipped past them.

“What'd you say?” she called back. "I can't hear you!”

Ross rested his head back on her shoulder, shutting his eyes. “Never mind.”

When they arrived at the stadium and went inside, the look on Phoebe's face worried him a little. He knew that look; he’d felt it etched into his own features more than a couple of times before. It was the expression he’d worn when he had nothing to lose.

“Phoebe,” he said quietly, reaching for her arm when they reached the doors just on the other side of the field. “Phoebe, you sure you’re feeling —” 

“— I’m fine,” she snapped, jerking away from him. “I’ll be even better once you see what I’m about to show you.”

“Okay,” Ross said, raising his arms and backing off, “I understand. But please make this quick, all right? We need to get out of the city while it's still dark out.”

“Just trust me on this,” Phoebe said, and he followed her out into the stands.

When he saw what she wanted to show him, Ross clutched onto Phoebe, despite the promise he’d made to himself to be the strong one.

“Oh... my... _God_ ,” he said.

There were hundreds of zombies lying in the field, the stadium lights shining down on them. _There must be a generator nearby that's keeping them on_ , Ross surmised. 

His next thought was to run, but Phoebe’s reaction time was quicker than his, and she held him back. He shook her off, still wondering why she would endanger both their lives like this. “Seriously, are you trying to get us killed?”

“Ross,” she said, raising her arm and pointing at the undead masses. “Look.”

When he did, Ross could see that they weren’t surging out of the field to run up and slaughter him and Phoebe. In fact, the zombies weren’t moving at all.

They remained flat on their backs, and when Ross squinted, he could swear that all of their eyes and mouths were wide open.

“What the…” he stammered. “Are they… Is that —”

“— Yeah,” Phoebe said. “I think the music is coming from _them_.”

“So…” Ross struggled to think, but it was already difficult enough with the obnoxious, upbeat music blaring from the demons down below. He put his hands over his ears to muffle the sounds, and tried again. “So, are they... charging? Like cell phones?”

“Yeah, some really gross ones.”

The constant poppy beat in Ross's ears, vibrating throughout his body, was making his head swim. Even though he knew he and Phoebe were safe for the time being, Ross felt ill just standing in the stadium, and not only because of the music. The sights of ripped flesh and decaying skin, this bizarre realization, the smells… everything was making him nauseous.

“Okay, great,” he said. “Look, as much as I _don’t_ appreciate you showing me this, we still need to get out of here.”

She looked at him and said, “Hang on a second. I wanna check something out.”

She turned back to face the field of monsters and lifted her arms above her head.  

“ _Hey_!” she yelled, jumping up and down. “You missed us! We're still alive! Yeah, that’s right. What’re you gonna do about it, huh? Huh?”

Ross grabbed onto Phoebe's arm, ready to make a run for it, but she stayed rooted to her spot, and Ross relaxed his grip when he noticed that none of the zombies had so much as batted an eye.

“They really are recharging,” he said, as Phoebe lowered her arms and panted a little. “In this state, they’re completely vulnerable.

“Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” he asked her.

“Yeah. They've got horrible taste in music.”

Just then, the song ended, and the studio version of “Smelly Cat” started blaring out through all the zombies’ mouths.

“Oh, _no_ ,” Phoebe groaned.

“No, that’s not what I’m talking about,” Ross said. “Look, this could be our chance to get rid of all of them! Or, at least the ones down there.”

She looked at him, puzzled. “I thought you wanted to get to Long Island and find Rachel.”

“We will,” he said. “But I want to come back after that, and I want these creeps long _gone_ by then.”

“Do you have an idea?” To add to the utter weirdness of their current situation, Phoebe started to grin. “Ooh, can we do the plan laugh?”

Ross let go of her arms. “What?”

“Oh, that’s right,” she said. “You weren’t there. I’ll teach it to you later, but only if you promise not to ruin it.”

“Let’s go,” Ross said, turning to leave. “We don’t have much time.”

 

 

 

“Why did you think it was a good idea to head _toward_ the music?” Monica hissed at Chandler as they rolled the babies in two brand new strollers down the sidewalk a block away from the stadium.

“I told you: I just feel like we need to go in this direction.”

“Okay, well, be careful. We don’t want to arouse any suspicion.”

“Heh. Arouse,” Chandler said, snickering.

Monica rolled her eyes, then froze as she heard footsteps approaching them in the distance.

“Did you hear that?” Chandler whispered.

“No,” Monica said just as quietly, reaching around behind her back to grab her rifle. “But whatever it is, I’m going to shoot it.”

“Hang on there, Mugsy.” Chandler put his hand over hers, halting her movement. He pressed his finger to his lips and moved up to the building they’d been walking beside.

Keeping his back pressed up to the wall, he moved toward the sound and the stadium. Monica looked on from her spot as he slid along the wall, until he reached the end of it. He paused, exchanging a look witht Monica for a second, then whirled around the corner.

“Aah!” Chandler yelped.

“Hi- _yah_!”

A tall figure came flailing out at Chandler around the corner, making wild karate-chop motions with his hands. Chandler ducked out of the way, causing the figure to careen right into a parked sedan at the end of the sidewalk.

“Oh my God,” Monica whispered, then yelled out, “Ross!” as she ran toward him.

 

 

 

Rachel got to the Williamsburg Bridge and groaned when she caught side of all the parked cars trapped on it. It'd take such a long time for her and Emma to pick their way through the empty spaces between the vehicles, and she didn't want to risk getting injured on the way across the bridge. She figured the same must have gone for the Brooklyn Bridge, and she was ready to deflate again, ready to let herself get beaten down by the unfortunate events that had befallen her, but she stopped and turned when her eye caught the sight of a dock nearby with several boats idling in the water.

“Come on, Emma,” she said. “Let’s go sailing.”

 

 

 

The reunion in the street had to be cut short when Monica pointed out that it would be daylight in a few hours. They decided to meet up again at Ross's, and on the way back home, riding behind Phoebe on the motorcycle, Ross didn't keep his eyes shut.

When he and Phoebe neared their apartment, Ross swore he could see not the vague outlines of Monica and her family, but...

"It's Carol," he said, holding himself from jumping off the back of the bike in his hurry to embrace his other family.  

Carol, Susan, and Ben had apparently arrived in the city the night before, having learned about the safety of darkness, and they came to see Ross. He hugged Ben until he said, “Okay, Dad, now it's getting uncomfortable,” and caught up with Carol and Susan, feeling, for once since this whole thing started, that things were finally getting back on track for him.

“Wanna helps us get rid of the monsters? It’ll be fun!” Ross heard Phoebe say to Ben as he talked to Carol and Susan in the kitchen. The city was still occupied by vicious cannibals, and Ross's injuries were still on the mend, but after looking back at everything, he figured things could be a lot worse. 

As Ben and the twins slept, Ross told the others about his theory and the stadium of zombies Phoebe had shown him.  Monica was unsurprisingly ready to test out his idea, and when Susan said she'd be willing to see if it worked as well, Ross and Carol exchanged equally surprised, but amused, looks.

They talked everything out for another half hour, looking at maps and a crudely drawn layout of the stadium that Ross had provided. It was only when Ross looked over at his sister and noticed that she was constantly rubbing her eyes, when he suggested that everyone should try to get some sleep and meet back at his place around two the next afternoon. The other parents left with their children in search of abandoned apartments in the building, digging another inch into the hole in Ross's heart when he thought about his daughter.

When they left, Phoebe stood next to his door.

"I think that went well," he said. "At least we aren't the only people in the Village anymore."

Phoebe nodded at that, her gaze angled toward the ground.

"Monica seemed to be okay when she saw the apartment," Ross said. "Or maybe that's because she's already started planning how she's going to fix it back up." He didn't know how that would be possible, since, from his vantage point, her old place looked beyond repair.

Phoebe lifted her eyes up to his. “Could I stay here?" she asked. "I kinda don't want to be alone right now."

“Yeah,” Ross said, “of course you can. I don't want to be alone, either.”

She gave him a grateful smile. "Thanks. Now, where's your booze? Never mind, I'll find it."

She walked past him and went into his kitchen, rummaging around until she came up with a bottle of something strong and old. Then she made her way back into the living room, taking a swig straight from the bottle, then another, and then about three more before Ross made a pained sound at the back of his throat.

"Don't you think that's a little too much?" he asked, falling silent only when she pulled the lip of the bottle away from her lips and fixed him with a steady gaze.

“My husband is dead, Joey and Rachel aren't here, and pop-loving zombies have taken over the streets. There's no such _thing_ as too much now, Ross.”

He sighed, relenting, and she put the bottle in his hand, goading him to take a swig. When he happened to glance at the label, he said, "Uh, Pheebs, seriously, are you really sure you can handle this? It's almost eighty percent pure alcohol."

She pulled the bottle away from him after he took a careful sip. "I can handle it," she said, her words already slurring. "What I can't handle is you not handling my handling of it.” She tipped back the bottle and wiped her lips as she made a sour face. "So there."

Ross moved to take the whole thing from her, thinking he could at least pour her a glass, but she jerked it away from him, showing him her shoulder. He sighed. "Give it to me, Phoebe. I don't even know why I'm letting you drink all of it."

“Duh, because I’m _dainty_ ,” she said, throwing back the bottle like a sailor.

 

 

 

 

Bedford Street stretched out before Rachel and Emma, wretched and ghostlike. As the first few rays of sunlight peeked over the horizon and the sky began to take on a lighter hue, she snapped her flashlight off and tucked it in her bag, then surveyed the neighborhood as she quickened her pace.

Dark stains marked the areas of vanished victims every few yards, and though most of the cell phones seemed to have been cleaned up as much as the corpses did, Rachel saw a couple of them here and there, lying upside down and sideways as she gazed up and down the main road. Papers fluttered in the early autumn breeze, along with the scattered leaves that rustled and dragged along the sidewalk she and Emma were walking down. 

She repositioned her scarf around her mouth, checking to see if Emma’s was still in place as she held her tightly by the hand and guided her down the road, walking cautiously past crashed cars and avoiding the odd piles of debris, broken furniture, and other things Rachel didn’t want to examine.

She heard a few shotgun blasts in the distance, less than a quarter mile away, and in the moment, while pressing her trembling hands against her daughter’s ears, Rachel believed she would never forget the sounds.

“Here we are, Ems,” she said as Central Perk loomed ahead in the distance. “We made it. We're finally home.”

 

 

 

Ross sat up on the couch, hung over beyond belief. He stumbled into the bathroom, favoring his good leg, and splashed his face with water that, fortunately, was still running from the sink. He went back out into the living room, fully prepared to die from alcohol poisoning, but he stopped when he saw his camcorder one one of his shelves, and on a whim, he picked it up.

Wiping his face and running his hands through his hair, he turned it on as he sat down, rewinding back to the video of when he and Rachel taped Emma taking her first steps.

On the small screen of the recorder, Rachel laughed, sitting on the floor and catching Emma as she fell over, and Ross rewound the tape to the beginning, during Emma’s first birthday.

Phoebe came out of the bedroom, looking just as hungover as Ross, and he barely heard her saying she thought that Rachel and Joey had made it back as well, because she could hear their voices on the video.

They watched the video of Emma’s first birthday together, chuckling at Phoebe’s song, but when Ross turned to look at Phoebe, he noticed that she was crying. After a moment, he realized that he was as well.

“It’s not fair, is it?” Phoebe said, dabbing at her eyes. “We were all so happy, and _alive_ , and…”

“If Monica and Chandler made it back, that means the others could,” Ross offered, but even he could hear the lack of hope in his voice. 

It had simply been too long. They were closing in on nearly eight days following the afternoon on which human technology backfired on its makers in the worst way possible, and it wasn't like Rachel had gone to Canada. Ross had always sort of worried about her, whether she could really take care of herself, much less a child. It didn't hit him until then that she would have made it back by now if she were still alive, which must have meant that…

Ross reached out and took Phoebe’s hand in his, squeezing it and drawing just as much strength from her as he was trying to give.

“Pheebs,” he said in a hoarse, thick voice. “I…”

She gave him a small, grateful smile.

“I know. And I am too. About Emma, and… And Rachel.”

“Thank you,” he said, and his breath hitched in his throat before he confessed, “You know, I think it was over between us, when she left. Long before she left.”

“Don't say that,” Phoebe said, wrapping her arms around him. “You don't know that. You always worked thing out.” 

“Yeah, that's what people kept telling us,” Ross said, leaning into Phoebe's embrace, finally allowing himself to admit the truth, to stop living in denial. “Even if she did come back… I don't think we would, Pheebs.” He drew in another shuddering sob when she patted his back and let him talk. ”And I... God, I think us getting back together might've been a mistake. I don’t know.” 

Phoebe quietly shushed him, but Ross went on. “No, I mean it. You and Mike, y'know, sometimes when we were all out together, I'd look at you two, and I'd look at Rachel, and once or twice I'd think, why doesn't she look happy?

“And I think I know why, now. I was so focused on getting everything perfect, that I couldn’t even realize we were right back where we started. Just angry at each other, all the time. I hated her being away, and she hated being around me. It wasn’t good for Emma. It wasn’t good for any of us, but I didn't see it - didn't _want_ to see it - until it was too late. And ever since this whole thing started, I’ve been thinking, maybe if Rachel and I called it quits a year ago, she wouldn’t have left. She'd be here, and Emma would be here, and at least they'd be okay.”

Ross's eyes were red and blurred with tears, he reeked of alcohol, his throat burned and he had never felt so clear-headed, so certain. “Rachel and Emma are dead right now. And I would give anything, _anything_ , to bring them back.”

“I would, too,” Phoebe said, hugging him tighter to her.

“I mean it,” Ross said against her shoulder. “I’d take it all back. I’d give up the last two years. The last _ten_. I would do anything, just to know they’re both okay.”

He squeezed his eyes shut and sobbed on Phoebe’s shoulder.

“Don’t cry, Daddy,” he heard, then, and felt a small hand on his face.

He stilled.

Then slowly opened his eyes.

Rachel was standing right in front of him. She looked exhausted and dirty, but she was there, holding Emma, who was touching his face.

“... What?” Ross said, loosening his grip on Phoebe as she made a shocked gasp.

“You’ve always been a drama queen, Geller,” Rachel said, smiling through her tears.


	7. 6

“They’re calling it The Pulse,” Rachel said.

“The who in the what, now?” Phoebe asked.

“Well, Charlie's calling it that,” Rachel added. “Y'know, the whole cell phone thing that started all of this?” 

“Oh,” Phoebe said, then sniffed derisively. “Yeah, I don't like that name. We should call it something else.”

“Okay, give me a second,” Chandler said as he shifted against Phoebe, then gestured with his hands as he pitched, “The Cell.”

Phoebe pursed her lips, then said, “I don't get it.”

“One Missed Call?”

“Ew, no.”

“Uh, okay, fine,” Chandler slumped down in his seat and half-heartedly said, “The Happening.” 

“Ooh, I like that one!”

Rachel tiredly rubbed at her brow. They were all sitting in Ross's living room, exhausted and awkwardly waiting for the sun to go down. The electricity and water were still working, which Rachel thanked her lucky stars for as she had first bathed Emma, took a shower and then heavily implied that Phoebe and Ross take ones too. She wasn't sure the power would last for much longer, so the group - _minus Joey_ , Rachel repeatedly thought throughout the day while worrying her lip  - had spent the day learning how to shoot and going over Ross's plan. Carol and Susan offered to watch the twins in an abandoned apartment down the hall, and Gunther had enthusiastically offered to watch Emma with them.

“You saw Charlie?” Ross asked Rachel after a minute of silence  ticked by. “Where?”

Rachel felt Monica's eyes practically drilling into her. The two of them were squished in Ross's single chair, while Chandler, Phoebe, and Ross sat on his leather couch. Monica had spent the last twenty minutes occasionally touching Rachel's hair, which was much better than when they first reunited. Monica had spent about a whole hour squeezing the air from Rachel's lungs and then pinching her repeatedly to check if she were real, sobbing things like “I'm so glad you've still got your face!”

Rachel cleared her throat before answering. “Oh, uh, in Long Island.” She had left out the part about getting lost, telling the others she'd wanted to lay low for Emma's sake. 

“Wha - _really_? How is she?”

Rachel frowned. She didn't know what was weirder, Ross interrogating her about Charlie, or the lack of her usual jealousy. “Not so good. I kind of, um... attacked her husband.”

“Nice,” Ross said approvingly. “Wait, why? Was he one of them?”

“Little bit, yeah.”

“Nice!” Ross said, then, when he noticed everyone staring at him, he coughed and said, “I mean, poor Charlie.” 

“Poor her? Poor all of us!” Monica said, obviously trying to change the subject. “I mean, Phoebe, I know I've said this before, but I am so, so sorry. We all are.”

It was as if a shadow crossed over Phoebe's face, but she nodded. “I know. Thank you.”

Another minute ticked by.

“If it helps,” Chandler said, “it was probably quick. I mean, if I know Mike, which I never really did, because —” 

Phoebe patted his leg and Chandler said abruptly, “— And _that_  didn't need to be said!” He turned to Ross. “Do you have a stapler I can borrow?”

“Okay, well, the bottom line is,” Monica said, “we’re lucky enough to be here, and alive. Let’s just try to focus on surviving, and taking down as many of those... those _things_ out there that we can.”

“We're still going through with the plan, right?” Ross said. “I know it’s kind of a crazy one, but...”

“Crazy’s pretty much all we’ve got going for us right now,” Phoebe said. “Not zombie crazy but, y’know. Regular crazy.”

“I wish Joey were here,” Chandler said, voicing Rachel's thoughts. “Doesn’t feel right without him.”

“Well,” Phoebe said, “if the rest of us made it here in one piece, Joey’s got to, right? I mean, he was on the other side of the country when The Happening happened. So that just means he’ll take even longer than the rest of you guys did to get here.”

“Actually,” Rachel began, then pursed her lips as she started touching her hair.

“What? What actually?” Phoebe asked.

“Actually, nothing!” Rachel said, “Come on, let's go kill these things - again? I'm still kinda iffy on the whole dead-undead thing.” She started to rise from the couch, but Phoebe went over to her and grabbed her by the shoulders.

“Wha - _hey_!” Rachel squealed.

“You talked to him, didn't you? Before this all happened? Where was he?” Phoebe demanded to know as she shook Rachel by the shoulders. “The last time I talked to Joey, he said he was driving, and that he'd get rid of his phone right away, so I couldn't call him and ask him where he was going. Rachel Karen Green, you tell me what you know or I'll —”

Rachel wrenched herself out of Phoebe's grip and rubbed her shoulder. “He said he was on his way here, okay? I called him the night before all _this_ happened, and I know he's coming back! That's it, that's really all I know! What I _don't_ know is whether I should be mad at you or glad you're on our side!” 

“I'd go with the second one,” Ross said. “If it weren't for Phoebe, I'd be dead by now.”

Rachel looked up at Phoebe, her shock over Ross's admission outweighing her shock over Ross's lack of reaction to her having called Joey. 

“Is that true?” Rachel asked Phoebe, her voice shaking slightly.

Phoebe crossed her arms and shifted onto her other foot. “I dunno. Why don't you ask him yourself? Except for gossiping about Charlie, you two've barely said anything to each other since you got back.”

The temperature in the room suddenly dropped several degrees. Everyone seemed to notice it, and they all started looking in separate directions.

Finally, Rachel looked at Ross.

“Okay,” she said. “Okay, we'll talk.” 

Chandler stood up and said, way too quickly, “So, we should probably head to Carol and Susan's new place and take the twins off their hands. What d'you think, Monica?”

“I think that's a great idea.” Monica got up too. “Come on, Phoebe.” 

“No, I'm good right here.”

“You should probably come with us,” Monica said pointedly. “You could catch up with Jack and Erica.”

“Why, what's there to talk about? I mean, aside from music-powered zombies, and how much the twins are gonna miss Chandler when he dies.”

“ _Phoebe_!” Monica and Rachel gasped.

She shrugged. “Oh, come on, I don't need some psychic ability to know that Chandler's screwed for sure.”

Chandler wordlessly headed out the apartment as Monica grabbed Phoebe's arm to drag her out of there. They shut the door behind them, leaving Rachel and Ross to look at each other.

Conversation about Emma would come later, in time. They'd figure things out with her, just like they had when Rachel moved out of his place the first time, but for now, they needed to have this talk.  _She_  needed to have it, before doing anything else.

Ross broke the silence first. “You know, when you said you got off the plane, that was the happiest moment of my life.”

“That was mine, too,” she said.

Rachel joined Ross on the long couch and drew in a deep breath.

“I...” she started, then paused. After a moment, she shouted, “I can _hear_ you all out there, you know!”

“It was Chandler!” Phoebe called back. “He pushed me away so he could hear you guys better!”

“Well, I figured I should get the best listening spot, since I'm gonna drop dead _any_ second now,” he snapped at her.

“Oh, did I say you? I meant me. Now move over!”

Rachel rubbed at her temple as Ross awkwardly shifted in his seat next to her. “Chandler, if it makes you feel any better, all of us could die tomorrow.”

“That _does_ make me feel better,” Chandler said.

“Then could you guys  _please_  give us some privacy?”

“She's right,” Monica replied through the door. “Okay, we're really going.” 

Rachel listened as their footsteps grew fainter, then she looked back at Ross, reaching out to grasp his hand.

“I lost the ring,” she said, turning her hand over so he could see for himself.

He shrugged. “I screwed up. It seems like every time we try to do this, I always somehow manage to screw it up. The list, the copy girl, the letter, Emily, the annulment, Paris... Actually, just thinking about all that stuff makes me wonder why you kept putting up with me.”

“If it helps," she offered, "I wasn’t innocent in all of it, either." She lifted up his hand, still intertwined in hers. “And I wasn't kidding when I said you know what to do with these.”

He didn't argue either of her points, for which she was very grateful. Instead, he said, “We had some good times, didn’t we?”

“Yeah,” Rachel said softly, lowering their hands. “We did.”

“But we had some... some pretty bad ones too. Too many.”

Rachel searched his face, catching his attention. He finally looked up, meeting her eyes.

“We’re not in high school anymore, are we?” he asked. In that moment, she knew that that wasn't what he wanted, just as much as she didn't.

“No,” she agreed. “No, we're not.”

“Friends?” he asked after a long stretch of silence.

With a genuinely loving smile, she told him, “Always.”

After they hugged for what felt like hours, she got to her feet and wiped tears off her cheeks, knowing that she didn't have to tell him her tears were born out of relief and happiness.

“Ross?” 

When he looked up at her, she said, “You were right, you know. We _were_ on a break.”

She swore she could hear him laughing as she walked out of his apartment.

 

 

 

Chandler stood in the center nosebleed section of the stadium, looking down at the sleeping, open-mouthed zombies on the field. His stomach was churning and if he breathed through his nose, he felt like he was seconds close to vomiting. He couldn't get away from this place fast enough.

He looked around him, at the others standing in the spots they'd picked out earlier. When Ross looked at Chandler from the left field section, Chandler raised his hand and made the 'Rock on' gesture.

After a moment, Ross returned it.

Chandler lifted the walkie-talkie he'd been gripping onto for the past twenty minutes like it was his lifeline, and spoke into it.

“Okay, honey,” he said to Monica, though he couldn't see her from where he stood. “Do it.”

Then he hunched over a little, bracing himself for the shockwave.

It didn't turn out to be as intense as Chandler pictured it. Almost, but not quite.

There was a moment of silence, and then, all the speakers in the stadium filled the air with sound, drowning out the catchy, mindless beat the zombies were emitting from their own mouths down below.

He'd picked out the first song: Bowie's “Space Oddity.”

“This one’s for you, man,” Chandler said to the only friend of his that wasn't there.

Then he broke into a run down the stairs.

As he ran in a zigzag pattern, he pressed the play buttons on all the portable stereos he had hauled up and set down on the aisle seats. Each of them had a different CD inside: jazz, classic rock, metal, classical, and anything else that wouldn't be categorized under 90s pop. He nearly tripped when he heard the upbeat polka music coming out from a stereo he'd activated on his left, wanting to laugh at the sheer ridiculousness of it all. 

He'd thought Ross's idea had been incredibly bizarre: fighting the undead with the sound of music. But, as he got to the bottom of his section, out of breath and shaking with anticipation, he figured that it made sense. In a way, it made more sense than everything else that had happened on the first afternoon of October.

He looked all around him at the others: Rachel, Phoebe, Ross and Susan. They'd reached the last step of their sections and were waiting, just like he was. Chandler pulled his noise cancelling headphones up from around his neck, and pressed them over his ears.

He listened to the quick, steady thrumming of his heartbeat, knowing that the mingled reverberations all around him would probably drive him past the point of no return if he could hear him. With a hurried glance, he watched the others mirror his actions, and stood, watching the piles of monsters below with his breath held in his throat.

Nothing happened at first. After a few long, torturous seconds ticked by, Chandler began to think that they'd failed, that he'd done all that work and busted his ass for nothing.

Then, he saw _it_.

He saw the zombies shift in unison, looking much like one of the human waves he'd been a part of once or twice in this very stadium. He watched them move, he watched them react, he watched them _shudder_ as the music washed over them, overpowering their own. He could've sworn he saw a couple hundred of them rise up off the ground, their chests arching up toward the sky, as their mouths closed, opened, then closed again.

Not all of them collapsed back to the ground, looking like bodies that had finally seemed to accept they were dead. But most of them did.

Most of them.

Chandler could think of nothing better to do than laugh in triumph and relief.  He turned to the scoreboard and changed it in his head.

_Zombies: 1. Humans: More than 1_.

 

 

 

When it was over, Rachel and the others went back up the steps which they'd run down, pausing to turn each of the stereos off. Their batteries would all give out by morning, and Monica suggested leaving the generator on so the speaker system in the stadium could keep playing.

When they all regrouped outside the stadium, Ross said that about a third of the zombies had not been affected by the music. At first, Rachel didn't want to leave them; suggesting that they use Monica's rifle - and the handful of pistols and box of bullets Susan and Carol had brought along - on the surviving monsters, but Monica didn't want to use up any of the ammunition they had just yet. At the back of her head, Rachel wondered if it were smart to leave the stadium, but she was too exhausted to stay.

They all were, she noticed as she looked at them.

Carol was waiting at Central Perk with the kids and, strangely enough, Gunther, who had run and locked himself in the storage closet as soon as the car crashed into the front window and had been hiding in the shop ever since. Rachel let Gunther hug her as Carol rushed into Susan's arms. They all hung around inside Central Perk; Rachel hid a smile as Phoebe complimented the duck-patterned bedsheet-and-tarp combination that Carol and Susan used to cover the large open window.

Rachel did Emma's hair as she sat at one of the stools in front of the door. Though she tried not to, Rachel couldn't help occasionally looked up at the door, as if, at any second, Joey would appear.

When someone _did_  knock on the door, Rachel's head snapped up, her heart skipping a beat.

It was some tall guy carrying a shovel and wearing sunglasses.

“Hey,” he said,  “D'you mind if we move this hockey stick from the door? It's kinda in the way.” 

Carol and Susan reached for their guns, but Monica stopped them once a tiny blonde woman joined the tall guy.

“Erica!” Chandler said, and Rachel picked Emma off her stool and set her down, her braids finished, before unlocking the door.

“Hi, guys!” Erica hugged Monica and Chandler, then waved at everyone else. “Thanks for letting us in. It's been a weird week, huh?”

“Well, after a while you get used to seeing the undead and running for your lives,” Chandler said nonchalantly. 

“Who's your friend?” Phoebe asked.

Erica started to introduce him, but the tall man whipped off his sunglasses and struck a pose. “Bert Macklin, FBI. We're gonna wipe out these assholes if it's the last thing we do.”

“I _sincerely_ hope that won't be true,” Carol said.

“We came here to make sure the kids are okay,” Erica explained. “If that's okay.”

“Sure, the more the merrier,” Monica said. “You wouldn't happen to have picked up a shotgun or ten on your way over here, huh?” 

“Oh. Well... No. But we've got a shovel!”

Out of the corner of her eye, Rachel caught Chandler glancing first at Bert, then at Monica knowingly, the way he did when they shared an inside joke.

“Good thing we went to the stadium,” Susan muttered under her breath, and at Erica's puzzled look, Monica started filling her in on everything.

Rachel thought she heard someone else outside, and looked back toward the door.

Nothing. No one.

“He's coming back,” Ross said, as if he could tell who she was thinking about.

_Whom_ , she corrected herself sadly, then said, “Yeah, I know. Just wish he'd hurry it up, is all.”

“I do too,” Chandler said as he brushed past Rachel and Ross to lay down on the long couch. "But in the meantime, I'm gonna get some shut-eye. See, I've never really been familiar with winning, and I'm starting to realize that it takes a lot out of you."

Rachel and her friends all turned to silently check if Gunther was okay with that. He'd been gazing at Rachel the entire time, and shook when he noticed everyone looking at him.

“It's fine,” he said after Rachel asked him the question again. “Not like I own the place.”

Rachel didn't think she would be able to sleep, but after everyone dragged Chandler off the couch, settled the kids down on it and then lied down in various spots on the floor, she found it all too easy to slip away into a darkness that was just as consuming as the night sky.  
 

 

 

When Ross woke up, he looked over at the front door, where Phoebe was standing.

Her back was turned toward Ross, and she had the handle of the emergency axe clenched tightly in her hand.

“Phoebe,” Ross said in a muddled voice as he stood up, trying not to elbow Chandler in the head as he tightened his arms around Monica. “What're you doing?”

“I think you should come look at this,” she replied, not turning back around to face him.

The sound of her voice was enough to set Ross in motion, to bring him over to the window beside her. 

His heart didn't stop beating, but he almost wished it had.

Across the street, lined up in front of the newspaper stand and looking back at them, were thirty or forty zombies, simply standing there with their tattered clothes flapping in the slight breeze. 

Ross's breath hitched in his throat as his gaze traveled along the line of undead New Yorkers. There were the CEO he and Phoebe had talked about earlier, his ex boss at the museum and the guy Ross had bought a couple hot dogs from at his vendor. There was this person he knew, and that person he was vaguely familiar with and many more that had been ruined long past the point of recognition.

In the center of the line, stood a woman with the most familiar face.

There was a jagged gash twisted diagonally down her face. The top part had been partially burned, and the melted flesh of her forehead drooped over one eye, obscuring it from view. Her mouth had remained more or less unmarred, and when Ross looked at it, he swore he could see her smiling as she parted her bloodstained lips.

“Is that  _Ursula_?” Monica asked as she drew up next to Ross at the window, her hands on her rifle, but not putting it up to her shoulder.

“Yeah,” Phoebe said. “In the flesh. More or less.”

“Holy...” Chandler said as he came up from behind Ross. “You know, the funny thing is, I've had dreams that were way weirder than this.”

The other adults approached the door as well, and for a long, long moment, the two groups looked across the street at each other. It would have been very much like one of the Westerns Ross used to watch as a kid, but at least in those, the good and bad guys had an equal fighting chance.

Which he and his friends did not.

It occurred to Ross, then, that he had been so incredibly naïve to think that he and the others were going to make it through this.

He looked over his shoulder then, his eyes resting on Emma and Ben, and his heart shattered all over again. He longed to wake them, to tell them how much he loved them and wished it didn't have to be this way, to end this way.

As he watched Emma shift a little and snuggle further into her half-brother's side, something snapped inside of Ross, and he cleared his throat before saying, “Let’s go out there.”

“Yeah,” Phoebe said, her tone matching Ross's. “Let’s see what my sister – well, what’s left of her – has to say.”

After Rachel unlocked the door, they moved their small barricade and gathered on the sidewalk outside Central Perk, their backs to the children.

Chandler said, “Okay, now that we’ve established that this was the dumbest idea _ever_ , I say we all go back inside and have some coffee.”

“No,” Ross said.

“We'd need to come out sooner or later,” Monica agreed, her voice small, but still just as resolute as Ross's. “At least this way, we won't be trapped inside like rats.”

“Why don't we just wait until dusk, when they'll leave?” Chandler pointed out. “Then we can get out of here, and _not_ have to die.”

“What if the night doesn't do anything to them anymore?” Rachel wondered. 

“Yeah,” Ross said, “not all of the ones in the stadium died because of the music, so maybe they've developed an immunity for the dark, too. Or being indoors.”

“Makes sense,” Susan said, sounding impressed with Ross's guess. “And I don't know about you, but I don't want to wait inside all day knowing they're out there. It'd probably make me end up like one of them.” 

Ross didn't know why he and Susan had always been so mean to each other, why he'd been so much at odds with her even after he'd completely gotten over Carol.  Susan was actually not such a bad person, really.

“What are they doing?” Carol asked, her voice much shakier than the others'. “I mean, they just keep _standing_  there. They couldn't possibly want anything else other than to eat us, right?” 

“Actually, they do,” Phoebe said, causing the others to turn their attention toward her.

“How d'you know?” Chandler asked.

Phoebe's gaze never wavered from her former sister. “Because she told me.”

A hush fell over the group in front of Central Perk, then Chandler said, “Again, I ask _how_.”

“Ooh, I know!” Rachel said, suddenly and proudly. “Charlie's husband - _ex-_ husband - was thinking things to me when he attacked us.”

The guy who insisted everyone call him Bert Macklin, FBI, said, “Really? Like what?”

“I dunno. Some dinosaur name.”

“Let me guess,” Ross said in a flat voice, “Boscodictiasaur.”

Rachel nodded as the zombies kept staring the whole group down. “Yeah, but it has a silent ‘M.’”

Ross held himself back from stomping on his healing ankle. “I _hate_ that guy!”

“ _Hey_!” Monica cut in, “Dozens of vicious, sorta-dead cannibals right in front of us. Can we please focus?” 

“Yeah, okay. This must mean they've somehow become telepathic,” Ross said, remembering the bond he'd mentioned to Phoebe days ago, when she'd just laughed it off. For once, he wasn't pleased with being right.

“That is so, so weird,” Chandler said. “And kinda cool.”

"So, what do they want from us?” Susan asked.

“She says she knows what we did to the others at the stadium,” Phoebe replied in a distant voice. "But she's not mad about it; she just wants to even the score a little. She says... She says she wants us to join them.”

“ _What_?” the others asked, all at the same time.

“She says it's easy: we can just pick up any old cell phone and make a call. She says it feels great, and...” Phoebe paused, then said, “All the free food we can eat.”

“Tell her ‘thanks,’ but we’ll pass,” Chandler said. “Even if that means we become the food.”

One by one, the others murmured their assent. 

“Our loss,” Phoebe said, her voice as cold as Ursula' s had always been. “She's giving us to the count of ten to change our minds. If we don't, they'll kill us, and take the kids. She's going to make the children just like them.”

“Over their dead bodies,” Monica said, and suddenly this was all going to happen, just as Ross imagined it. At least, he reflected distantly as everyone readied their assorted weapons, when they died, they would go down fighting.

“Gunther,” he said, still facing forward, feeling his entire body hum with coiling energy. “See if you can go inside and play something on the sound system.”

“Ten,” Phoebe said.

“That wasn't really part of my job,” Gunther admitted, still sounding just as nonchalant as he had about everything for as long as Ross had known him. "And for the record, I've always thought Rachel was too good for you.”

“Shocking,” Ross said, trying to ignore Phoebe as she ticked off another number down to the group's collective doom.

“Please, Gunther, can you try?” Rachel asked, “Look, if it doesn't work, then —”

She was cut off by the sound of the door to Central Perk banging shut behind Gunther.

“Eight.”

“Do you _really_ have to do the countdown for us?” Chandler asked as Monica readied her rifle beside him.

Ross didn't think she could stop herself, for she sounded like she was in a trance. He desperately willed Gunther to hurry up in the back. 

“Yeah,” Gunther called out, “I have no idea how to work this thing. I always got someone else to play it for holidays and shows.”

“Oh, fine, I'll do it!” Rachel snapped before running into the shop.

“Six.”

_Come on_ , Ross thought as a bead of sweat gathered at his temple and trickled down his brow. _Come on_.

“Hang on,” Rachel said from inside the store. “I think I've got it.”

“Five.”

A burst of sound finally rolled outside from the speakers in the back, turned up to the highest volume setting. It skipped a beat, stopped, and started up again, a guitar riff blaring through the tarp and bedsheet.

_So no one told you life was gonna be this way..._

The group stood there, motionless, as the musicians clapped.

_Your job's a joke, you're broke, your love life's DOA!_

“What the hell is this?” Chandler asked.

Wincing, Monica said, “I don't know, but it sure isn't working.”

“Three," Phoebe said, and Ursula raised up the corners of her mouth in an amused, feral grin. 

“Can't you change it?” Carol yelled back over her shoulder as she and Susan raised their guns.

“It’s stuck!” Rachel replied. “It won’t go to the next song!”

Ross groaned. “You have got to be _kidding_ me.”

“Two...” Phoebe said, then, Ross felt her straighten up next to him as she seemed to shake herself out of her trance. “Okay, you know what? You know _what_? Screw this.”

In the blink of an eye, Phoebe jerked her arm back, launching her axe across the street. It twisted in mid-air, handing unceremoniously with a squelching sound deep into Ursula's shoulder. 

She stumbled backward a few steps as a horrible, wounded sound erupted from her throat. She looked down at the blade embedded inside of her, then back up at Phoebe with the closest expression a zombie could have that seemed like genuine shock.

“ _That’s_ for coming over here and trying to kill us,” Phoebe said to her twin. “That’s for making us stay cooped up inside during the day, for ruining the city, for messing with Joey, for ending the world.

“And, above all else, that’s for breaking my thermos.”

The zombies surged forward before Ross could draw in his next breath, their feet pounding in time to the syncopated rhythm of the song that continued to spill out from the speakers inside the coffee shop. He almost expected them to start dancing.

Unfortunately, they didn't.

Ross looked on as Phoebe broke away from his side, running over to Ursula and wrenching the axe out of her shoulder, then hacking her head off with it.

Then he snapped into automatic survival mode, yanking his pistol out of the back of his pants and aiming it to quickly shoot at one, two, then three of the rushing, snarling zombies that were coming right at him. He could barely make out what was right or left, and he caught only brief glimpses of the others shooting, hacking and trying to fend off the surrounding zombies as they filled up the street. There was a flash of Monica and Chandler, back to back and shooting at grey, trudging figures. That was Phoebe running past them to flip her axe right into one zombie's back before it could deliver a killing bite to Bert Macklin. Then Ross couldn't see them, because there were five zombies surrounding him. He reacted to them on a purely instinctive level as he fired off shot after shot, aiming for their heads, then hurriedly reloaded with the bullets in his pocket. He managed to fire off a few more effective rounds, but he was tired and far from an expert shot, so he was missing most of them. During his third re-load, a zombie jumped on his back, pushing him to the ground and sending the gun skittering away from him on the sidewalk.

He felt the brief, white-hot flare of pain on the back of his neck as the zombie on top of him sank its teeth into his skin, and it was really hitting him that this was it, this was how he was going to die, and his thoughts had erratically turned to his son and daughter when the weight of the zombie on him went slack and it became truly dead.

Ross slid forward on his stomach out from under the zombie, getting dust and blood all over his hands, then snatched up the gun. When he stood up and turned around, he saw that Susan had jammed a pocket knife into his attacker's neck.

“Thanks,” he said, his gratitude coming out in a voiceless whisper.

“Don't mention it.  _Really_ , don't,” Susan said with a half-smile. Then she swung back around to help Carol.

Ross started after her, but got hedged in on all sides and resumed shooting into the masses of teeth, decaying flesh, and nails. When the last of them fell, Ross noticed Gunther at the front door of Central Perk, knocking aside zombies left and right with a hockey stick before they could get inside the shop.

“Gunther, _no_!” Ross heard Rachel cry out as she pounded on the door from inside.

“I'll save you, Rachel!” Gunther called back to her in a choked voice, even as blood was gushing from his neck and arms onto the pavement. “Just stay inside!”

Even as Ross emptied his gun's chamber into the monsters clawing and biting at Gunther, even as he saw them go still, Ross knew he was too late. Gunther swayed, then fell onto the sidewalk, clutching the fatal wounds in his neck and abdomen.

Rachel flung open the door, shoved the really-dead bodies off of Gunther, and knelt down to cradle Gunther's head in her lap.

“Thank you,” she said as she kissed his cheek.

Gunther shuddered. “Oh... I think I can die happy now.”

And then he did.

“Rach, I'm sorry, but you should get back inside and watch the kids. You'll be safe in there,” Ross told her as he turned his back on the shop, feeling around inside his pocket for more ammunition.

Just a handful left.

He cursed under his breath as he reloaded one last time, trying to ignore the pounding in his head.

“You wanna know something?” he faintly heard Monica say as she joined him in front of the shop, shoving the butt of her rifle into the face of what had once been somebody's grandmother before it could get to Chandler. “This  _really_  makes me want to go back in time and kick Alexander Bell's ass.”

“Well, children, it's been nice knowing you,” Chandler said grimly, pistol-less, as he, Ross, and the others backed up against the ledge of Central Perk. “At least we'll be mutilated together.”

Phoebe choked up on the handle of her axe, and didn't even flinch as she planted it directly into a teenager's face. When the twitching corpse toppled over at her feet, she said, “Yeah. We're all here, except for —”

_BANG._

Right in front of their eyes, one of the approaching zombie's heads simply burst apart.

After the headless corpse collapsed onto the filthy pavement with a dull splat, all movement in the entire street ground to a halt, including the other zombies that stopped and turned their heads in unison, toward the end of the street.

Then, without warning, five more of the undead began dropping to the ground like stringless puppets, after their heads all seemed to spontaneously combust.

Ross peered through the dusty haze, barely making out the silhouette of a musclebound figure standing at the end of the street, the barrels of his shotgun still smoking. Soon, it also became apparent that, spread out behind the newcomer, were other figures hurrying toward Central Perk, holding an assortment of guns as they surveyed the scene before them.

The song on the speakers changed to the next one.

It wasn't as loud as the previous track, and Ross couldn't recognize it at first.

When he did, he knew that they were going to win.

About ten of the monsters froze in place when they heard the music. They began to retreat with flailing, jerking movements, as if they couldn't get away fast enough. In seconds, they dropped like flies.

At the same time, the gun-toting crowd surged forward into the street, rushing ahead of the first man, who took longer, slower strides into the battlefield. Some of the new arrivals joined the group in front of Central Perk and began passing out extra shotguns, much to Monica's delight, while others blasted off the remaining zombies' heads.

It wasn't until someone from the back of the crowd of humans started moving further into the street that gave Ross pause.

Compared to the first muscular guy, the man in the back, dressed in traditional Army fatigues, looked less like a war hero and more like a raggedy-ass player in a battle re-enactment.

Or a low-budget film.

Ross could tell, then that the soldier really was his friend, looking back at him and the others.

The sixth and final link in their indestructible chain.

_“Joey_.”

Ross whipped his head to his left, to the source of the voice that had somehow seemed much louder than all the thunderous gunshots and groaning, terrible noises all around him, and he saw Rachel standing beside him, gazing at the lone figure down the street.

“Rachel?” he asked her.

_“Ross_!” Chandler chimed in giddily.

“Chandler, I swear I'm gonna —” Phoebe gritted out between clenched teeth, but Monica put a calming hand on her arm as Ross looked back at Rachel.

“How's Emma?” he asked her.

“She's safe, with Erica and the other kids. I fixed the music after she came in," Rachel answered, her voice barely above a whisper as she kept staring at Joey. “They're all fine. Emma's fine.”

She shifted her focus directly onto Ross then, fixing him with a sharp, piercing look, and he knew what she was thinking.

He squeezed her shoulder. “I''ll cover you. Bring him back, Rach. I'll make sure they don't get anywhere  _near_  Emma.”

Rachel nodded, and said, “Good.”

Less than a second later, she dashed into the fray – stumbling once or twice over bodies, bullets and busted cell phones – to get to Joey.

Ross automatically raised his gun and took aim at a lone zombie heading right at her. He forced himself to keep his hands steady, clipping the monster's shoulder with one bullet, then another. A split-second later, Joey shot the same zombie, effectively knocking it down. Their shots were so fine-tuned, so perfectly synchronized, that it was almost as if they'd choreographed their actions beforehand, in their sleep.

Before Ross could congratulate both of them on performing such a feat, he caught sight of another zombie stumbling toward Rachel from her right.

Never breaking her stride, she pulled back her arm and  _punched_  it. It swayed, comically, to one side before toppling over onto the pavement.

Ross stood where he was, unable to hold back the sudden laugh of mixed amusement and relief that erupted from him, but his laughter died away as he watched Joey take one slow, dragging step toward Rachel.

And then he spread his arms, dropping his shotgun just as Rachel ran right into him, the force of her momentum sending him stumbling back a few steps.

Ross kept watching them from his spot, through the battle, as they collided.

They wrapped their arms around each other: Joey's around Rachel's waist, hers around his neck.

As Joey held Rachel, he lowered his head a little to say things into the shell of her ear. Things that Ross knew he would never know.

When the two of them broke apart slightly, but maintained their steady grip, they just  _looked_  at each other, as if they were the only people on the street, as if the world weren't falling apart at the seams all around them.

And, in that moment, Ross began to smile.

Beside him, Phoebe lifted her axe up out of a corpse's head and screamed down the street, “JOSEPH FRANCIS TRIBBIANI, THIS IS  _NO_  TIME TO BE PICKING UP WOMEN! YOU COME OVER HERE RIGHT NOW AND HELP US KICK SOME  _SERIOUS_  ZOMBIE ASS!”

Everyone stopped and stared at her.

Even all the zombies.

She shrugged. "Well, I wasn't the only one feeling like chopped liver, was I?”

After the battle resumed instantaneously, after Joey picked up his shotgun and he and Rachel ran back to the front of Central Perk, hand in hand and dodging zombies, Phoebe tossed her axe aside and flung her arms around Joey, pounding on him a little as she sobbed into his shoulder.

Joey took the beating and rubbed her back as he murmured, “I know, Pheebs, I know. Sorry I didn't get here sooner.”

Then, Chandler put down his new shotgun, stepped forward, and hugged Joey too.

Ross and Monica set their guns down and, along with Rachel, joined the others in the most awkward, tearful, and inappropriately-timed group hug they ever had.

It was also the one they needed the most, since that one fateful day they all were together for the first time.

They all stood on the spot, drawing out the long embrace, savoring the silent, powerful sensation of unity, of feeling the last pieces of their puzzle finally clicking into place. They held each other on the battlefield's sideline, as more zombies lost their heads and others started to retreat, as the autumn sun continued shining down on them.

When they finally broke apart, dabbing at their faces with grimy sleeves and wrists, Chandler said, “For once, I hate to ruin the mood, but shouldn't we get back to, oh, I don't know... Beating back the hordes of the walking, technically not-so-dead?”

“Yeah, as moving as all that was, a little help here would be nice,” the first musclebound guy Ross had seen said, right before blasting a couple rounds into an approaching zombie with his shotgun. “I mean, it's not like the world revolves around the six of you.”

“Oh, right,” one of them said. In that moment, it really didn't matter which of them was speaking. “We'll help.”

After they finished collecting themselves, each of them took up a weapon and rose in unison, to defend their coffee shop and kids with all the strength they had.

 

 

 

Funnily enough, the fight only lasted another minute.

The monsters retreated as a single unit back toward the stadium, and the survivors all headed into Central Perk. The six recently reunited friends were exhausted beyond belief, and covered in blood, sweat, tears - and other things too gross to mention - but they were alive and together.

Together.  



	8. 7

“Your timing was... perfection,” Chandler said to Joey.

Phoebe nodded. “Yeah, and I don’t want to sound like a sitcom character or anything, but you got some explainin' to do.”

After opening a box of cookies from the back, Joey sat down and told the others his story. When he got to the part where he was surrounded by zombies, the others were all staring at him with wide eyes, even as he sat there alive and well before them.

“I was lying there, thinking of all you guys,  ready to let those jerks rip me apart, and then it hit me that I couldn't give up,” he said, meeting his friends' gazes and sharing a lengthy one with Rachel before continuing. “So I kicked a couple off of me and rolled under a car nearby. They pushed it over, and that's when I thought I was _really_ done for, but Derek and the others showed up.” He gestured toward the man with a double-barreled shotgun who had first appeared on the street, the man who was in the corner enthusiastically making out with a shorter, but just as muscular man. “Thought I left them back in Arizona, but they decided to come to New York. They followed the signs I marked, and they found me just in time.” He shrugged, lifting a cookie up to his mouth  “Talk about dumb luck, huh?” 

“And now for the million dollar question,” Chandler finally deigned to ask with a grin. “What’s... what’s with the getup there, soldier? I mean, at least at the wedding, we knew why you were all dressed up.”

After swallowing his first cookie, Joey stood and looked down at his ruined fatigues, as if he were seeing them for the first time, and, brightening a little, he said, “Oh, yeah! I ran into some army guys, and they gave me all this stuff.  I thought, 'Wow, these look really cool,' so I put them on, and thought they would help me feel more… tough, you know? Like I’d do a better job at getting over here if I could look the part. I think it worked out pretty good!”

He put his hands on his hips and puffed out his chest, looking absolutely ridiculous.

“Never change, Joey, never change,” Phoebe said, reaching out to pat him on the arm.

“So,” Chandler said as he rubbed his hands together, “who’s up for a round of poker?”  
 

 

 

Emma and the other kids had slept through the whole thing.

When she awoke, yawning and rubbing her eyes, her mother was right beside her, combing back her hair and smiling down at her.

"Hi, honey. Didja have a good nap?”

“Yeah!"

It was strange for her at first, seeing all the new people who were milling about in the coffee place. It seemed like the grown-ups were having one big party that lasted well into the night. She kept asking why they were celebrating, wondering what all the fuss was about, but all she got in return were kisses on her head, her cheeks, and squeezes from her parents and their friends.

Not that she was complaining.

A man in dirty green clothes knelt down in front of her as her parents stood off to the side.

“Hey, Emma,” he said. "Remember me?”

“No,” she said shyly, but after a moment, she recognized his scent.

_Hugsy._

She smiled back at him, still a little uncertain, but the feeling went away when the man told her, “I’m your Uncle Joey.”

 

 

 

The first few days and nights after the humans won what Chandler called The Battle of Central Perk - the name needed some work, but it would do for the time being - everyone had gotten some much-needed rest, and began to set about their task of clearing out the street in front of the shop. It didn't strike anyone as ironic that their street was the one area in which none of the zombies in the city ventured into, during neither day nor night.  Some would probably get up the nerve to come back eventually and try to get their revenge, but until then, the group took full advantage of their new safe haven.

"Sucks about the apartment,” Joey said as he and Chandler hauled what was left of a zombie into a wheelbarrow from the piles of bodies on the pavement. "It would've been perfect for you, Mon, and the kids to move back in there."

"That's okay,”  Chandler said. "We decided that the one downstairs isn't so bad, if you ignore the possibility that Mr. Heckles' ghost might still be hanging around and just waiting to start haunting us. How's your old place, by the way?”

"Still as empty as I'd left it. It's weird, you know. It's almost like it was... waiting for me to move back in.”

Chandler picked up the wheelbarrow and rolled it over to a tire. "Well, it wasn't alone.”

He and Joey were suddenly hugging, then, and they were still locked in a tight embrace when Chandler opened his eyes and saw Monica approaching them, wearing a mile-wide grin.

"What? What are you smiling about?” Chandler asked her, and she nodded toward Joey.

"It's just... It's good to have you back.”

“Totally,” Chandler said. "I mean, no offense, but we wondered if you had camped out at some star’s mansion back in L.A. Or maybe a Denny’s. I still don't know why you were already on the way over here before the cell phone thing happened, but whatever the reason was, I'm glad it didn't involve a plane.”

Joey froze for a second, and Monica looked at him. As he opened his mouth to speak, she quickly said to Chandler, “Honey, isn’t it obvious? He left early because of _you_. He probably missed you so much that he wanted to come over for a surprise visit.”

“Uh, yeah,” Joey said, nodding fervently. “It was all for you, man.”

“Aw,” Chandler said as he looked down at his feet. “Well, you know, you could've just… called.”

“So, I heard Rachel's staying over at your place for now," Joey said, obviously trying to change the subject. "How's she doing?” Chandler noticed that, unlike the last million times Joey used a different version of that line, his words were solely concerned.

“Holding up as well as the rest of us,” Monica said.  “She said she's gonna find her own place and settle down there with Emma. I guess she and Ross will figure out what to do with her then.”

Joey nodded, then bent down to pick up the tire and set it down on the small pile in the wheelbarrow. While he was busy with that, Chandler leaned in toward Monica and muttered, “So, if Rachel's moving out, does that mean we finally get to have some celebratory 'Yay, we're alive!' sex?”

“Definitely," Monica said. “In fact, I'm starting to think, sex on the balcony? Not such a bad idea, after all.”

“The world _so_  needs to end more often," Chandler said, and she kissed him, taking over the wheelbarrow and guiding it over to the bonfire at the far end of the street.

After watching her go, Chandler turned to Joey and said, “D’you ever get the feeling that our lives are kinda like a soap opera, slash sitcom?” He grinned. “A comera?” He knew the punchline sucked, but in the moment, he didn't care.

“Not really,” Joey said. “Trust me, if our lives were more like the characters’ on _Days_ , things would be a hell of a lot weirder.”

Chandler nodded as he put his hands in his pockets, glancing at the patch of pavement they'd exposed with a thoughtful expression on his face.

“Even weirder than zombies?” he asked.

“Even weirder than zombies.”

Then, Chandler said to him, “So, do you think you, me and Ross could go out one day and play a friendly game of Fireball with them?”

“Dude," Joey said, "I've been _dying_ to do that.”

 

 

 

Phoebe and Monica were on clean-up duty as they stumbled across a large, pink bike with tassles.

“That’s not…” Monica started to say.

“No. Mine was in storage in my apartment. “It’s probably long gone by now,” Phoebe said, running her fingers along the new one's handlebars. “Up in that big bike stand in the sky. But this’ll make a pretty darn good replacement, don’t you think?”

When Monica pointed out the lack of training wheels, Phoebe said, “My old bike had them? Oh, _that's_ why I stopped falling down! I thought the bike had forgiven me for neglecting it!”

Monica tried not to laugh at that. Then she said, “So, are you taking this back with us?”

“Yeah,” Phoebe said, folding up the kickstand and leading the bike onward. “I think it’s time I finally learned how to ride one of these without the kid gloves on, you know?”

 

 

 

Though he didn't need to patrol the neighborhood streets, Joey liked the feeling of walking around outside with a gun, feeling useful and, okay, pretty macho. It seemed that playing soldier had been the best role he ever landed, and he was more than willing to keep up the act. 

He was just wishing that John McClane could see him now, when a voice from behind him said, “Hey, Joe,” and he promptly ducked, waving his weapon around wildly as he yelped.

When he met Ross's face, he straightened up. “Dude, you scared me.”

“Sorry.”

“What the hell are you doing anyway, sneaking up on me like that?" Joey said, his heart still jackhammering away in his chest. "I could’ve shot you.”

Ross raised his eyebrows. “Well, first of all, we both know that your catlike reflexes are _way_ better than mine.”

Joey grinned, nodding in agreement. “Yeah, they are!”

“And second of all,” Ross said, grabbing the muzzle of Joey's gun and shaking it back and forth with ease, “this is made out of _plastic_.”

Joey groaned. “Aw, I told Chandler not to put the Nerf guns so close to the real ones!”

As he let go of the gun, Ross cleared his throat. “Honestly? I didn’t think you were going to make it over here, man.”

“Yeah.” Joey shook his head in shared disbelief. “For a while, I didn’t think so, either.”

“Well,” Ross said. “I’m… I’m glad you did.”

Joey felt even more confused than usual. For a long, _long_ portion of his life, he hadn't bothered dealing with mixed emotions. Either he was happy, or sad, or hungry, or horny – and most of the time, the latter two emotions were the case. However, in one of those rare occasions of depth, he was once again torn between being the happiest man on the planet, and the guiltiest one.

“Listen… About Rachel,” Ross started, as though he’d read Joey’s mind. Yet Joey knew he would have been an even bigger idiot than usual to have not seen this talk coming.

Joey took a deep breath, then said, “Yeah. Look, Ross, I —”

“— No, please. Just… hear me out, okay?” Ross raised his hand, but it was not clenched into a fist, so Joey relaxed.

“The thing is,” Ross said, “I didn’t think this was ever gonna happen again, but it did, and… it’s my fault. Hers, too, but it’s mostly mine. And at the same time, I guess it’s neither of our faults. I really thought things would be different this time, but I – I guess I should’ve known that they wouldn’t be.” He let out a humorless chuckle. “Maybe it’s better that things turned out this way, instead of us getting divorced.”

He paused, then added, “Again.”

Joey averted his eyes.

Ross reached out and touched Joey’s shoulder after a moment. “Joey, if there’s anything going on between you two – or if there ever will be – there’s nothing I can do to stop it. And I, I don't want to. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking, and I’ve realized that if she can be happier with you, well…” He paused to draw in a deep breath. “Then that would make me happy, too.”

Joey let the silence draw out between them for a moment, then, flicking his gaze up to look Ross directly in the eye, he said, “Really?”

Ross took a hesitant step toward him, then rocked back on his heels as though he were second-guessing himself, but Joey closed the distance between them and wrapped him up in a tight bear hug.

When they parted, Ross smiled.  “I guess I don’t need to tell you that if you ever hurt her or Emma...”

“You’ll kick my ass?” Joey said as he started to smile too.

“Well, I’ll certainly try.”

“Fair enough.” 

"Come on," Ross said. "Monica's throwing some of the canned stuff together for all of us."

As they both started on the way back, Ross told Joey that, even with a fake gun, he still looked pretty cool, and John McClane would’ve been proud of him.

 

 

 

As Rachel and Monica put up signs for their family members and any other survivors in the city up on the wall next to Central Perk, Rachel asked Monica if she planned on going back to Westchester.

“Are you kidding?" Monica said. "I’ve got an entire city to clean. I'm not going  _anywhere_.”

After she hung up a poster for her parents, Rachel let her arms fall to her sides, and said, “Do you think they'll ever make it? Both mine and yours?"

“I don't know," Monica admitted. "I'd like to think so." Privately, she had already made her peace with them never showing up. Even more privately, she especially made her peace about her mother never showing up.

“At least Frank and the triplets made it back. It's still so heartbreaking, what happened to Alice.”

“Yeah. She was... She'll be missed." Not knowing anything else to say about her, Monica knelt down and picked up a large banner, holding out one end of it and letting Rachel take the other end as she took a few steps back. They raised up on their toes, taping the banner against the wall.

“What about your sisters?" Monica asked as she finished taping her side of the banner's bottom corner. "Don't you want to put up signs for them?”

Rachel wrinkled her nose. "Nah. I mean, I hope they're alive and safe, but... I don't think they're heading over here.  The last I heard, Jill was in Colorado with some of her friends, and Amy went to Atlantic City with some guy named Barney. So if they turn up, they turn up. And if they don't, that's fine, too.”

“That's what Chandler said about his parents," Monica said as she and Rachel put up a few more fliers. "He doesn't really think they'll come because they're both probably on the same cruise ship filled with male strippers, whether they're alive or dead.” 

Rachel chuckled at that, then hesitantly said, “I know what you’re thinking.”

Monica raised her eyebrows. “If it’s what we’re gonna do about hot water when it runs out, or the stadium, then I'd say you're right on the money.”

“Phoebe said something about letting all the zoo animals loose in there.”

Monica pursed her lips. “Hmm, it's a good theory on paper. But it needs work."

She and Rachel stood together in silence for a moment, looking up at the covered wall, then moved toward each other, each of them putting their arms on the other's shoulder.

“I'm sorry I didn't know things had gotten that bad between you and Ross," Monica said. "If I did, I would've..."

Rachel shushed her gently, leaning her head down on Monica's shoulder.  

“For a while there, I thought I'd lost you," Monica whispered. 

Rachel closed her eyes. “I came back for you," she said. “For everyone. You didn't think I was going to let you hog all the fun without me, right?"

“Not a chance. But now that all the fun and games are over, are you sure you still want to move into your own place?"

“Yeah. You've got a pretty sweet set-up, but Emma and I are taking up too much space, and the one across from yours is kind of nice. It'll be like old times."

“But will you be okay by yourself?" Monica asked, pulling away from Rachel slightly, though she kept a tight grip on her shoulder. "I mean, it's just going to be you and Emma. You've never lived on your own before."

“I know, and I think it'll be challenging at first, but Emma and I will manage. This is just something I need to do, at least for a while," Rachel said, the corner of her mouth tugging up a little. "You know, the whole hat thing."

At first, Monica didn't catch the reference, but when she looked into her friend's eyes, she got it.

“There is one more thing,” Rachel said as they walked away from the wall their arms around each other. "What do you think I should do about Joey?”

“Well,” Monica said, “I think that, for once, I'm the wrong person to be asking that sort of question.”

Rachel took that in for a moment, and nodded. “You know what? You're right.”

Monica squeezed her arm gently. “Aren't I always?”

 

 

 

Rachel knocked on the door, and Joey opened it.

“Hi,” she said.

As he invited Rachel inside his barely furnished apartment, Joey sighed, taking a seat in a dining room chair he'd snagged from an apartment down the hall. Rachel sat down next to him, on the only other chair in the living room, reaching out to touch the faded green jacket Joey left lying on a small table near the chairs.

“I was really hoping you’d work things out with Ross,” Joey said after a moment of silence.

“Why?” Rachel asked, genuinely curious. “You know how things have always been between us. You know how crazy and horrible we’d get with each other. I mean, you’ve all been there since the beginning. Through all of our beginnings and endings. Ross and I… We always did put the rest of you through so much.”

There was an apology floating around in her last words, somewhere.

His eyes lit up again as he said, “But you know what? We all made it through those times. You did too, and you will now. To this day, you are one of the strongest, most incredible women I know. And," he added, "I’ve known a _lot_ of women."

She scooted her chair closer to him, putting her hand on his as she squeezed it.

They sat together, talking for a while about this and that, until she drew in a breath and told Joey she'd seen him at the window. Because she knew, now, it really had been him.

“You were there? How did… What…” His eyes widened, then he closed them as he bowed his head forward. “I wish I would’ve looked up and seen you then.”

“It’s okay, sweetie,” she said, sliding her hand from his to stroke his arm.  “Don’t beat yourself up about it. I mean, things worked out in the end, didn’t they?”

“Yeah, I guess they did."

“How did you even get to Long Island?" she couldn't help but to ask. "I mean, that's one of the reasons why I didn't think it was you.”

“Oh," he said, comprehension dawning on his face, “That was all Shane's doing. Y'know, Derek's boyfriend. He and the others had picked up a helicopter, and after they saved me, he flew it all the way out to where your mom moved to. When we couldn't find you, we went to Queen's, and after I made sure my parents and most of my sisters were okay, well... You know the rest.” 

Though that explanation satisfied Rachel's curiosity, she was still perplexed about one thing.  “How did you know I was at my mom's? I didn't say where I was when I called you. I thought we'd meet back here.”

He shrugged. “Well, I know where I'd go if I was having a hard time. Figured maybe you did the same.”

Rachel smiled, but then it faltered.

“What's wrong?" he asked.

“When I saw you from the window, you looked… mean.” 

“Oh, yeah,” he said, fidgeting a little. “Well, I was only eating about three times a day, since we had to keep moving. You know how I get when I don’t eat that much, right?”

Rachel looked at him - really,  _really_ looked at him. She could see the ways in which he’d changed, and the ways he had not since they first met.

Deep down, he was still her dear, sweet Joey. She knew he always would be.

“What’s that?” she asked, pointing at a square object sticking out from one of the pockets of his ruined green coat that he'd flung across the table.

Joey looked down and brightened, saying, "Hey, all right! Thought I lost this,” when he pulled out the object, revealing it to her.

It was a copy of  _The Zombie Survival Guide_.

“I found this in a bookstore I crashed in one night,” he said, holding up the battered, blood-stained book. “Some of it turned out to be pretty helpful, I’ll tell ya.”

For the first time in a long time – too long – she saw him grin his classic Joey grin.

“Think we should put this one in the freezer?” he asked.

And that was when Rachel leaned over to kiss him. 

 

 

 

Ross was feeling pretty good about his idea for a book. It would be the first one to be published following the end of the world, an immediate classic, a story for the ages. The others didn't look too thrilled at his proposal, but he figured the plot he'd had in mind was too advanced for his friends to understand.

“I'm telling you," he said, "A security guard at the Natural History Museum discovers that all the displays come to life at night!"

“Oh, Ross,” Monica said, “even if the world hadn’t just ended, no one would ever want to hear a story as bad as that.”

“Maybe we could rework it into a comic book," Chandler mused. “Or it could be a movie."

“Only if I can play the security guard," Ross said, in total seriousness.

“Ooh, you know what would make it even better?" Phoebe said. “If that big T-Rex skeleton acted like a dog!” 

“What? Why would it —” Ross stopped when he saw the look on Phoebe's face, and said, “Sure, of course it can.” 

Phoebe beamed.

“Wait," Monica looked around at everyone who was gathered in her living room, noticing that two people were missing in action. "Where's Rachel and Joey?”

“They’re, uh…”  Ross paused to clear his throat. “Catching up.”

 

 

 

When Rachel moved onto Joey's lap and straddled him, never taking her lips off his while his hands went up her shirt, she realized, then, that they had been too close before as friends to do this, but after being apart for as long as they had, she needed this more than ever, just as much as she needed air.

She nipped at his bottom lip as she sighed and felt his hands press into the small of her back, then lightly drifted up her spine and grazed along the curves of her breasts, and she moved against him steadily, deepening the kiss and enjoying the low sounds he made at the back of his throat. Unlike it had a few years ago, the desire she felt for him now had built up and up in a slow and steady way, gaining strength and speed rather than being a sporadic, fleeting burst of lust.

As she put one hand around the back of his neck and slid her tongue into his mouth, she reached down to slip her other hand in between their bodies to run it along his —

“Woah, woah," he said, pulling his head away from hers.

He did it with so much force that they tipped over a bit in Joey's chair, dangerously close to crashing backward. 

Before they could, Rachel leaned backward, rocking them to their starting position, and when they both looked at each other again, their breathing still ragged, she started laughing, and he ended up joining her.

After they got their wind back and their laughter trailed off, she leaned in to kiss him again, but he turned his head to the side.

“What are you doing?” she asked. “This is the farthest we’ve ever gone with each other. Don’t ruin it now!”

“We..." he said, licking the spots she'd kissed, spots she desperately wanted to kiss some more. "We shouldn’t be doing this.”

“Why not?” she asked, then rolled her hips as she pressed herself closer to him, eliciting a small sound from him that fell somewhere between a moan and a chuckle. Lowering her voice to a whisper as she leaned in to start kissing his neck, she said, “Give me one reason why.”

He let out a long, weary sigh. “Yeah, you got me. But here, now? After you broke off your engagement  _and_  after the world ended?” He shook his head resolutely. “It wouldn't be right, right now. You know that. We _both_ know that.”

“I know we both know that, but do we _really_ need to know we know that?”

Despite the pained expression on his face, Joey closed his eyes and, in one quick, smooth movement, he lifted Rachel up off of him, and gently put her back on her chair.

“So,” she said, smoothing down her rumpled clothes to mask her disappointment and giddiness, “just to be clear, we’re never getting past first base, are we?”

“Well, I think we made it past second for a — that isn’t the point!”

“I thought it was,” she said reaching out to play with the one of the buttons on his shirt. “It’s kind of a point I'd like to keep making.”

He pretended to be engrossed with the book he’d left on the table, flipping it open and glancing down at it instead of Rachel.

She put her hand over his and the book, stilling his movements and trying to get him to meet her eyes. As she waited for him, she could see, once again, just how conflicted he was, just how much he was struggling to keep his loyalties and love in check.

“Joey,” she said, “I know what you’re trying to do, but you can’t protect me from this – from _us_ – anymore. Do you still want this?”

He was still silent for a few more moments, his eyes still averted from hers. He said, “I've wanted this since the day I met you, Rach. But not _just_ this, not just now. I...” He swallowed, and, though he didn't say anything, when he looked right at her, his gaze said more than any words could.

With her heart swelling and chasing away the ache she'd felt for him since he'd left, Rachel looked back at him, hoping he could see that she felt the same way.

Joey let out a loud, long breath in exhalation as he lowered his head, looking happy and relieved and still just a little bit nervous. When he looked back up at Rachel, he said, “You sure?"

Scooting her chair closer to his, she reached out to pick up his hand, and placed it on her thigh.

“I am sure, Joey. I think back then, when we tried it the first time, we were both too scared to mess things up between us. But I’m not scared anymore. Are you?”

When he drew closer to her, she just _knew:_ whatever lay ahead of them, all the bad parts and good, she could make it through with him.

After everything she’d been through, before the end of the world and after it, Rachel Green was not scared anymore, especially not of this. 

When Joey brushed her hair away from her face before he kissed her again, she knew that neither was he.

 

 

 

“You sure you don’t want us to stay back?” Monica asked.

“No,” Phoebe said. “No, I don’t want to do this alone.”

Even now, even after all these years, Phoebe Buffay-Hannigan could not, _would_ not, do this alone. She had already been alone for so much of her life that, ever since she’d befriended the five most obnoxious, self-absorbed, talkative, dramatic, hilarious, loving, and amazing people in the world, she couldn't possibly imagine doing this without all of them around her.

At least, not during this first visit.

“It’s nice,” Phoebe said, putting the many-ringed fingers of her right hand up to her eyes. “Thank you so much for doing this, you guys. It’s... No, you know what? Screw that ‘nice’ crap. It’s perfect. Mike would have loved this. ’Course, y’know, he probably would’ve liked to be _alive_ to see this, but —”

The rest of her words got stuck in her throat, and she closed her eyes as she started to sway to one side.

Standing next to her, Monica and Rachel each put one arm around their friend, squeezing her tightly and keeping her on her feet.

“I am so, so sorry, Phoebe,"

“I'm sorry, Pheebs."

“Yeah," she said. "I am, too.” 

She reached out with trembling fingers, and stroked the glossy, black surface of the makeshift headstone.

“I’m really gonna miss you, Mr. Bag,” she murmured. “More and more… Every day.”

After looking down for a few silent minutes at the large chunk of Mike’s old grand piano that was wedged into the earth, she and the others slowly turned around, and started heading out of the small, peaceful graveyard they'd made in Central Park.

 

 

 

“Y'know, when you told everyone we were gonna go off to have some shooting practice, it probably would've helped if we brought our guns,” Rachel said, smirking to hide her curiosity and excitement. As the sun went down, Joey led her by the hand down a street several blocks away from Central Perk.

“Oh, yeah, don't worry about that. They know where we're going. Aaand...” he trailed off as he stopped in front of a storefront with its windows intact. “Here we are.”

Rachel raised her eyebrows as she looked at the store's sign:

Time Out Paris.

“After you,” Joey said as he let go of Rachel's hand, then opened the door and gestured for her to go first.

Still intrigued, Rachel walked in slowly.

As she looked around the shop, turning in a circle, she gasped.

The place had been cleaned to the point where it looked brand new, the lights from several battery-powered lamps giving the place a bright, happy glow. All around her, there were clothes on racks and even more racks that had been brought in from stores around the city, every piece of garment begging to be examined. 

It was as if the place hadn't been touched by the end of the world. It was...

“It's yours,” Joey said. “Say ‘Hello’ to your new office!”

“It's mine?" she asked, “Really?”

“Well, you said you wanted something to do other than cleaning up, or trying to figure out how the heck to fix the power system, or freeing the zoo animals —”

“— Don't tell me that Phoebe actually did it.”

“Yup,” Joey said with a proud grin and a nod. “I think she needed it, too.”

“And you had absolutely nothing to do with her little rescue mission, right?” Rachel said with a grin.

“I had to, Rach! The koala bears looked so sad. But I let her handle the snakes. I mean, I had to draw the line _somewhere_.”

Rachel laughed and went back to marveling at the store. “I mean, it’s pretty much what I've wanted to do, since we're trying to save water. And it's not like we'd have to pay for all this stuff, anyway. But when I mentioned figuring out our clothing situation the other day, I never thought you would...” She looked back at Joey, her eyes welling up with tears.

“Well, you know, Monica helped a lot,” he said as he rubbed the back of his neck. “So did Ross.”

She went up to the racks and shelves, and it was in the latter that Joey's craftsmanship - or lack thereof - stood out the most. A couple of them had been reconstructed at awkward angles. Some of them were too big, or too small, and they looked like they were going to collapse any second under the weight of the shoes and belts and accessories resting on them.

When Rachel turned back to look at Joey, she said, "It's beautiful."

“I’m glad you like it,” he said, beaming at her. 

“Oh, I love it!” she said, throwing her arms around him. When she pulled back, she told him to wait a moment, and went to the walk-in closet.

She came back out a minute later, presenting Joey with his very own men's bag.

“Seriously?” he asked, slinging the bag over his shoulder and nodding at it appreciatively when he checked himself out in the full-length mirror. "Hey, what d'ya know? Still fits pretty great!"

She joined him in front of the mirror, linking her arm around his.

“Yeah,” she said, resting her head against his shoulder as she looked at their reflection. “Yeah, it really does.”

 

 

 

Emma was busy digging with her hands, her tongue pressed into the corner of her mouth in concentration as she worked with all the strength she had.

She was too busy pulling on the shiny, red plastic object in the sandbox that she didn't notice the snarling sound of an approaching zombie until it was right behind her.

The happy, upbeat music - "Baby Elephant Walk," she'd been told it was called, and she liked it a lot - that played on a nearby speaker one of the adults left there, had lulled her into a dozing state, and she froze.

The monster behind her reared up to its full height and roared down at her.

Then, quick as a flash, her mother appeared, smacking it hard with a bat. 

“Get outta here!” she yelled, hitting the zombie until it ran away, whimpering a little. 

“Mommy!” Emma cried as she flew into her mother's arms, as if a six-foot slouching, ravenous monster hadn’t just been terrorizing her.

Her expression was stern, but still loving. “I told you to be careful out here, honey. There's some bad people still running around, remember?”

“I know,” Emma said, looking sorry until she remembered her prize. “But I needed to dig a lot for this,” she brandished the red shovel she'd found, and her mother whistled, looking impressed.

“Excellent. But I’d be careful when we get back if I were you, Ems. Joey might fight you for it.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” Emma said, thinking hard. “I know! We can share it. Like when I stay with Daddy and have Hugsy, and you have sleepovers with Joey!”

Her mom turned red for some reason and smiled as she touched her hair. “Oh, uh, yeah, that's a great idea! Wow, would you look at the time, there? It's almost dinner!”

“Can we please stay out?” Emma said, but the sun was starting to go down, and the monsters were still outside, probably looking for careless little girls to eat. Emma knew she and her mother were outside the border of the Safe Zone, and had to go home soon. 

“Come on,” her said, holding out her hand. “Everyone’s waiting for us.”

Emma looked forward to that. Maybe her dad would teach her something new about dinosaurs when she got back, and the other grown-ups would pretend to fall asleep - Emma didn't know why, because she always liked his lessons and T-Rex voice. And maybe Joey would read her “Love You Forever,” again, even though she pretended she was too old to hear it. Maybe Aunt Phoebe would do another cool tea-leaf reading for her and her cousins, or she’d play “Smelly Man,” for them on her guitar. Maybe Auntie Monica would let Emma help out with dinner, even though the sight of live, twitching lobsters and gaping fish still scared her. And maybe Uncle Chandler would ask Emma to pull his finger, and her mom and her friends would beg him to stop, but Emma would giggle and do it anyway. And there was a _very_ good chance that Uncle Chandler would then blow raspberries and make a funny face, making Emma and the other kids laugh.

Maybe, maybe, maybe...

Before any of that could happen, though, there was something she had to do.

“Can you push me on the swing?” she asked, reaching out to tug on her mother’s free hand.

For a second, she wouldn't move, and Emma was ready to be let down again. 

Then her mother said, “Oh, why not,” and propped her bat against a bench to sweep her hair up into a messy ponytail. “But only for a minute!”

“Push me high, Mommy!” Emma cried, her heart racing in excitement as she tore over to the other side of the playground. “So, _so_ high that I’m flying!”

As mother and daughter reached the swings, the zombies that were still scattered around the streets of Manhattan turned in unison and yawned sleepily as they started staggering back toward their own home.


	9. Tag

**Later**

As the group sat around and drank coffee in Central Perk, Phoebe suddenly asked, “You know what I miss?”

"Getting the morning paper every day?" Monica wondered. "Gourmet cooking?"

"Ooh, getting new fashion and celebrity gossip magazines every month," was Rachel's guess.

"What about new documentaries at the IMAX theater?" Ross asked. "Or the Internet?"

"How about the days when we used to sit around and _not_ talk about what we miss?" Chandler said.

"Look," Joey argued, "the only thing worth missing more than anything else from before is a meatball sub. No question."

“Why would I ever miss that?” Phoebe asked. “I'm a vegetarian. Which actually worked out _really_ well for me."

"Yeah, it sure did," Joey grumbled as he leaned back in his seat next to Rachel, then seeming like he'd already forgotten about his loss. 

“And I'm glad you're all sharing, I really am,” Phoebe went on, “but I believe we were talking about what _I_ miss the most.”

“So, what _do_ you miss, Pheebs?” Rachel asked.

After being lost in thought for a moment, Phoebe said, “Aw, I forgot what it was!”

Carol came in through the front door, saying hello to everyone, and handed Rachel a letter.

“Who’s it from?” Rachel asked.

Carol shrugged. “I just got it from a group that came over from Long Island. One of them said it was from a friend of yours. Some guy named Charlie? I don't know." She headed over to the counter where Susan was, and kissed her in greeting.

“Oh, Charlie!” Rachel said, grinning as she opened the letter. “She says 'Hi,' and she’s coming here in a week.” Rachel covered her mouth with her hand. “She... also says she found Benji and buried him.”

The group looked appropriately sad - that is, until Ross said, “So you think that means she’s ready to start dating again?”

Everyone else groaned.

“Come on, Ross,” Phoebe said. “You could be a little more sensitive about it.”

“Yeah,” Ross said, “you're right, Pheebs. I'll just, uh, give her time to mourn before I ask her if she'll ever be interested.”

“That should give us an extra week to plan their wedding,” Phoebe muttered to Rachel, who held back a laugh.

“You know we're not gonna have any problems when she gets here, right?” Joey asked Rachel quietly as she set the letter down and wrapped her hand around his. “There's only one woman for me.”

“Well, whoever she is, she is very, very lucky,” Rachel said before they grinned at each other and exchanged a slow kiss.

“That’s still weird to watch, by the way,” Monica said.

“Yeah,” Chandler said, his arm around Monica as she leaned against his shoulder. “You know, if you really think about it, we make one _awful_ group of friends.”

Just then, the front door slammed open, and Frank stumbled in, panting and gasping out, “Pheebs, Pheebs! Zombies. They're coming!”

“ _That’s_ what I miss!” Phoebe said.

Monica looked at her in alarm, then asked Frank, “How far are they from here?"

“About two blocks away, but they’ll get here in about…” Frank paused to calculate for a moment. “Ten minutes."

"Ten minutes?" Rachel said, looking disappointed. "Wow, they aren't what they used to be these days."

"I wouldn't underestimate this group," Frank said. "The kids are safe upstairs, and I'm gonna try to round up the other adults, but we've gotta act fast. This group might be slow and... not wearing any clothes, but they still look like they could do some damage. And there are a _buttload_ of ‘em. Think you all can handle it?”

Phoebe laughed. “Please.” Without batting an eye, she and her friends reached under their chairs for their weapons and started to reload or sharpen them.

“Wait,” Chandler said as they started to get up, and everyone paused. “Let’s think about this for a moment. There aren't that many of them left, and they probably know, on some level, that they don’t have the upper hand anymore. Maybe they’re here for, y’know, a truce or something. Maybe... Maybe they even want to be friends.”

After a lengthy pause in which the group considered that possibility, they shook their heads, and, in unison, said:

“Nah.”

Then they all got up and went outside to fight the ugly naked zombies.


End file.
